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NEW YEAR’S TRAGEDY: Murder-suicide in township PAGE 6A
America loses master potter Warren MacKenzie BY DEBRA NEUTKENS EDITOR
A remembrance on Warren MacKenzie’s web page talked about how he inspired and enriched so many lives with his handmade pieces of pottery, brightening the tables of generations. It noted how he shared his knowledge with new potters and continuously inspired people to artistically express themselves. “America has lost a great master potter and American treasure, but a legacy of pottery will continue,” the tribute read. The renowned potter from Grant died at home Dec. 31. He was 94.
It was the functional aspect of his pieces that was most important to the artist. “His pottery was so accessible,” said Suzy Hudson, executive director of the White Bear Center for the Arts and a self-professed MacKenzie groupie. “That was core to his ethic.” Born in Kansas City, MacKenzie grew up in Wilmette, Illinois. He took ceramics at the Art Institute of Chicago in the early ‘40s, later moving with his wife Alixandria to the United Kingdom to apprentice with studio potter Bernard Leach. That was his first encounter with the mingei pottery style of Japan, which inspired much of his work. From there, the couple moved to Grant in
1952 where he built a kiln in a converted barn on their 50-acre property. The area became known as Mingei-Sota in reference to his influence as potter and mentor. Well known as a teacher, MacKenzie was a ceramics professor at the University of Minnesota from 1953 to 1990, when he retired. He also taught workshops around the world, including classes and demonstrations at the White Bear Center for the Arts. Biographies of MacKenzie describe his goal as the making of “everyday” pots. “He truly loved being a ‘mud man’ SEE POTTER, PAGE 9A
DEBRA NEUTKENS | PRESS PUBLICATIONS
Warren MacKenzie chatted with people shopping for pottery at the Pots in the Grass sale the first weekend in August.
Coal tar refiners sued for polluting ponds BY DEBRA NEUTKENS EDITOR
WHITE BEAR LAKE — The city is joining six others in lawsuits blaming coal tar refiners for contaminating stormwater ponds. Filed on the last Friday of 2018, the federal lawsuit claims seven refiners of coal tar contaminated ponds with toxic chemicals called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The PAHs are found in coal tar sealants, used throughout the region on driveways and parking lots until the state banned sales of the hazardous material in 2013. White Bear Lake had already banned the product three years earlier. The city was first in Minnesota and the fourth in the country to prohibit use of coal tar-based sealcoats in 2010 after PAHs, known to cause cancer, were found in stormwater retention pond sediment. The chemical compounds form when coal is incompletely burned. Because PAHs do not break down easily, the compounds stay in the environment for a long time. The lawsuit, filed by the New York law firms of Weitz & Luxenberg and Super Law Group and the Minneapolis firm
DAVIN BRANDT | SUBMITTED
Fleeting season
Ice boating enthusiasts took advantage of favorable ice and wind conditions on White Bear Lake, above, and Bald Eagle Lake, at right, last week. The sailors might get a rare extended run to their season as weather forecasters are predicting rain followed by colder temperatures.
SEE LAWSUIT, PAGE 8A
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