August 5, 1926 Weather from the Hill, Olaf Thorvaldsen | Cook County News Herald

The first full week of August promises nearly perfect weather. Expect blue skies, light winds, and temperatures close to the seasonal average, interrupted only by a warm spell next Wednesday when the mercury should climb into the 80s. I am told that on such afternoons many respectable citizens suddenly discover pressing business at the harbor or along the lakeshore. I cannot say whether this is true, only that the weather will provide an excellent excuse.

The season is quietly changing. Fireweed now stands in brilliant bloom along the roadsides, while the first asters have begun to flower. It seems a strange arrangement that the flowers announcing autumn arrive while summer still feels so young.

Elsewhere, the weather has been far less accommodating. Wildfires burning along the Montana and Washington borders have now consumed some 600,000 acres. In California, six million barrels of oil were destroyed in a great fire that even produced tornado-like whirlwinds. Along the Florida coast, a West Indian hurricane has claimed two lives and caused damage estimated in the millions. One is reminded that even when Grand Marais complains about the weather, we often have much to be thankful for.

Last weekend Miss Fjell persuaded me to accompany her to Mr. and Mrs. Charles Boostrom's celebration at their new lodge on Clearwater Lake. The dining room was cleared for dancing, and although the road there is hilly and crooked, it seemed determined to dance a little itself. I hope many of you will also come out this weekend to cheer on our Grand Marais baseball club as they meet Fort William on our home grounds.

Watching the flowers along the roadside this week reminded me of Ella Wheeler Wilcox's little poem, The Weed. It seems fitting for this season, when so much beauty first appears where few think to look.

A weed is but an unloved flower!

Go dig, and prune, and guide, and wait,

Until it learns its high estate,

And glorifies some bower.

A weed is but an unloved flower!

All sin is virtue unevolved,

Release the angel from the clod—

Go love thy brother up to God.

Behold each problem solved.

All sin is virtue unevolved.

Perhaps that is true of places as well as flowers. Since arriving in Grand Marais, I have found that what first appears ordinary often proves remarkable after one takes the time to know it.

Editor's Note: The photo is of fireweed. It starts blooming during the summer at the bottom of the stalk, and as summer continues it blooms from bottom up. When the flowers at the top are in bloom, it means summer is over.