The daily digest of Twin Cities culture | Secrets of the City

Richard Johnson’s photos of weathered storefronts, thrift-store castoffs, and tattered religious iconography in northern Minnesota serve as an astute chronicle of the erosion of small Midwestern towns. He grew up in Cloquet, which he describes as “an OK place,” one with “a slightly higher-than-average number of churches as well as per-capita consumption of distilled spirits, and the distinction of lending its name to a big forest fire.” After developing a severe allergy to