Duluth, Minnesota four Catholic schools with coverage up to grades 6 or 8, two Protestant schools, two Montessori schools, and six other charter and private schools. Due to its proximity to the Great Lakes, Duluth is the location for the Large Lakes Observatory. The Large Lakes Observatory operates the largest university-owned research vessel in the Great Lakes, the R/V Blue Heron. Built in 1985 for fishing on the Grand Banks, the Blue Heron was purchased by the University of Minnesota in 1997, sailed from Portland, Maine, up the St. Lawrence Seaway to Duluth, and converted into a limnological research vessel during the
Minnesota Point Light Bayfield of the British Navy, who chose a spot on Minnesota Point as the zero point of his mapping. The point is the eastern end of a great sand bar separating Superior Bay from the lake; the passage to the east of the point (known as Superior Entry) was the original outlet of the Saint Louis River. The Saint Louis River, which rises in Minnesota, becomes the Saint Louis Bay, then flows into Superior Bay and exits into Lake Superior via the ship canals, at each end of Minnesota Point (Park Point). Both Superior, Wisconsin, and Duluth, Minnesota, sprang up