One Son of Hibbing Enjoys Ventura's Comments on Another

For Michael Ventura,
    Amazing how it takes an outsider to get a whole new perspective on an area. Good job [“Letters @ 3am,” March 17].
    Bobby Zimmer is not the only one who hasn't been able to see the forest for the trees around Hibbing, Minn.
    We took a friend from Austin visiting us in Ely a few years back to visit Zimmerman's and Greyhound's birthplace.
    While at the Greyhound Bus Museum we swung around the corner to the Haul Rust Mine overlook.
   A dark back corner of the gift shop held a small group of faded newspaper articles about Dylan.
    At the time that was about the only acknowledgment of the prodigal son in all of Hibbing.
    Younger folks of Hibbing are beginning to realize that someone rather famous and influential came out of their town, but resentment is there to this day.
    Hibbing seems to be just coming out of a decades-long love-hate relationship with Dylan but I think both have had a gross misunderstanding about each other over the years and maybe even themselves.
    Believe it or not, the area is not such a culturally dead place as Dylan would lead us to believe. Albeit things have probably changed since Mr. Zimmerman left town, but we have been to some great concerts in the auditorium of his alma mater.
    Grand Rapids is a very active cultural community, hosting artists from all over the world. Ladysmith Black Mambazo only a few weeks ago at the Rief Center in Grand Rapids. We will be going to a Ricky Scaggs concert at Coleraine High School next month. You missed that in your trip down 169, between Grand Rapids and Bovey.
    The Rief Center concerts at the Coleraine High School auditorium have even hosted such Texas notables as Ray Benson and Asleep at the Wheel.
    Fun reading your piece on Hibbing.