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You may have become used to the furry faces in WCCO's weather center over the last four weeks, but Movember is about to end. All month, WCCO has been sharing with you the stories behind the mustaches, including one man whose battle against testicular cancer has a miraculous ending.
Just as the charity was announcing a downturn in donations, the mysterious "St. Grand" is once again leaving generous donations in the Salvation Army's red kettles. A donation of $1,000 -- in the form of a bundle of 10 $100 bills -- showed up in a red kettle in Roseville on Black Friday.
You know the old saying: money doesn't fall from the sky? Well, it did on Black Friday at Mall of America. Serge Vorobyov threw $1,000 in dollar bills from the fourth floor of the Mall of America rotunda as a choir performed "Let it Snow" on the ground floor below.
A man remains hospitalized after being shot by police during a chase Friday evening. Investigators say he fled in a car when an officer pulled him over at around 5 p.m near Front Avenue and Marion Street. His passenger bailed during the chase and got caught.
Former Minnesota Orchestra conductor Eiji Oue is returning to conduct the orchestra's locked-out musicians in a pair of holiday concerts. Oue will conduct the musicians on Dec. 14 and 15 in the Minneapolis Convention Center Auditorium.
Sam Thomas suffered from crippling panic attacks. The attacks were so severe that Thomas would miss weeks of school at a time. Big groups terrified him. And the more school he missed, the worse the attacks got when another school day approached, creating a cycle that only got worse.
James from Apple Valley and Anna from Sartell wanted to know: When did Black Friday start? According to BlackFriday.com, the term "Black Friday" was coined back in the 1960s, but it was really 1924 - the first year of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade - that the day after Thanksgiving became the unofficial start to the Christmas shopping season. Early on, when the term was coined in 1961, it had a negative connotation because Philadelphia Police used it to describe the traffic jams and clogged sidewalks of that day. But, by the 1980s, the idea of the Friday after Thanksgiving putting the retailers back in the black (or profitable) started to take hold.
Next year, it will only be a story to tell the kids. After 22 years, those storybook floats are going dark. This is the final season for the Target Holidazzle parade. The parade's a lot to look at, especially if you've never seen it before. Friday's parade was Alicia Harris' first. "I heard it's going to be my last, so sad," Harris said. The news hit Claudia Fuglie especially hard.
A man is hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries after being shot by St. Paul Police after he tried to flee officers during a traffic stop on Friday evening. According to St. Paul Police, an officer stopped a vehicle just after 5 p.m. near Front Avenue and Marion Street, but the driver fled soon after. The suspect eventually slowed his vehicle and jumped out near the intersection of Front Avenue and Woodbridge Street. Officers at the scene fired their weapons at the suspect, wounding him. No officers were injured.
Friday night marked the beginning of the end of downtown Minneapolis' Holidazzle parade, and WCCO-TV was there to capture the luminous celebration. Frank Vascellaro and Amelia Santaniello emceed the parade's opening night, which coincided with the official lighting of the WCCO Weather Watcher.
The whole WCCO family is excited about our latest addition – the WCCO Rooftop! It has an outdoor kitchen, a working gas fireplace, locally grown plants and an amazing view above Nicollet Mall in downtown Minneapolis. There's green, local, lush landscape to use for an array of purposes, including outdoor camping segments and even musical guests. The plants are mostly locally grown, and the soil is locally sourced from Mississippi Top Soils in Cold Spring.
Thirty-one years ago on Thanksgiving Day, a massive fire in downtown Minneapolis robbed the Northwestern National Bank of its iconic weather ball. But on Friday, a new twist on the weather ball concept was shining over Nicollet Mall.
In the season where hundreds of homes are decorated with holiday displays, there's one residence in Bloomington that always draws a crowd. An oak tree in Bob Little's yard shines bright every year, attracting spectators from all over. In the light of day, an old oak tree may not inspire the holiday spirit. "There isn't Santa Clauses moving, and things spinning, and red this and green that," Little said.
Black Friday is the official start to the holiday shopping season, and it started earlier than ever -- 8 p.m. at the Mall of America. A new report by the University of St. Thomas says this is the mall where most Minnesotans will do their holiday shopping. "We love the bonding experience, hanging out with each other," said shopper Nicole Klinkhammer, who was at the mall Friday. There was a lot of buzz about starting Black Friday too early, but the Mall of America team says as long as people want to shop, they will be open. And it's working out fine so far. They project a higher turn-out than last year, when the mall opened at midnight.
A St. Paul man is dead after a head-on crash in Olivia on Wednesday afternoon, according to the Minnesota State Patrol. The fatal accident occurred at 1 p.m. on Highway 212 near Highway 71 in Renville County. A 1999 Volkswagen Passat, driven by 55-year-old Bu Shwe, collided with a 2011 Dodge Ram, driven by Michael Traxler, age 31. Shwe was killed in the crash. Traxler, of Long Prairie, was unharmed, as was his passenger, 18-year-old Hope Nue of Granite Falls.
