218 Area Code 🌍☎️

Duluth is a port city in northeastern Minnesota and the county seat of St. Louis County, with a population of 86,697 as of the 2020 census, making it Minnesota's fifth-largest city. Located on Lake Superior's north shore at the westernmost point of the Great Lakes, Duluth is home to the world's farthest inland port accessible to oceangoing ships and the largest and busiest port on the Great Lakes, handling cargo including coal, iron ore, grain, and steel coil. The city was named after French explorer Daniel Greysolon, Sieur du Lhut, who explored the St. Louis River in 1679, building on earlier European fur trading activity in the region dating to the early 17th century. Duluth is a popular Midwest tourist destination featuring the Great Lakes Aquarium, the iconic Aerial Lift Bridge, and Minnesota Point, the world's longest freshwater baymouth bar at 6 miles long, while serving as the gateway to the North Shore scenic route to Thunder Bay, Ontario. The Port of Duluth is among the top 20 U.S. ports by tonnage and provides access to the Atlantic Ocean, 2,300 miles away, via the Great Lakes Waterway and St. Lawrence Seaway. Brainerd is a city in Crow Wing County, Minnesota, serving as the county seat with a 2020 population of 14,395, and is part of a larger micropolitan area of 96,189 residents encompassing Cass and Crow Wing counties. Founded in 1870 by Northern Pacific railroad president John Gregory Smith as a railroad crossing site on the Mississippi River and named after his wife Anne Eliza Brainerd Smith and father-in-law Lawrence Brainerd, the city was officially organized on March 6, 1873, and became a major railroad hub that employed over 1,000 workers at its peak in the early 20th century. The city's early economy centered on lumber, paper, and agriculture, with the Northwest Paper Company establishing its first mill in 1903, and by the 1920s approximately 90% of residents depended on railroad employment until the industry's decline led to diversification. Brainerd is widely known as the partial setting of the 1996 film Fargo and experienced notable historical events including the 1872 "Blueberry War," the 1876 charter revocation, and the 1933 bank robbery by Baby Face Nelson and his gang. Today, tourism and the paper and service industries are Brainerd's primary employers, with the historic Northern Pacific railway station converted into breweries, coffee shops, and event venues, while BNSF Railway maintains a equipment maintenance facility employing approximately 70 people. Moorhead is the county seat of Clay County, Minnesota, located on the Red River of the North in the fertile Red River Valley and forms part of the Fargo-Moorhead ND-MN Metropolitan Area with a 2020 population of 44,505. Platted in 1871 and named after Northern Pacific Railway official William Galloway Moorhead, the city is home to Minnesota State University Moorhead, Concordia College, and a Minnesota State Community and Technical College campus, making it a higher education hub. The city hosts several corporations and manufacturing industries and is known for the original Dairy Queen location that pioneered Dilly Bars and operates under a unique 1949 contract allowing exclusive menu items like the chipper sandwich. Moorhead gained historical significance as the intended destination for a concert featuring Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and The Big Bopper before their fatal February 3, 1959 plane crash. Situated on the bed of glacial Lake Agassiz, which drained 9,900 to 11,000 years ago, the region surrounding Moorhead contains some of the world's flattest and most agriculturally productive land.