How would you like to win…an OLD car? That was the offer 51 years ago

In 1966, Herberger’s department stores had a contest, sponsored by Wrangler jeans, in which the grand prize was a Rolls-Royce roadster…made in 1931.  Even if no La Crosse customer won the car, they could still get a record player, or a 12-inch TV, or portable hair dryers.

Folks in Wisconsin watched TV coverage of a moon landing in 1966…the landing of the unmanned Surveyor 1 satellite.  Surveyor was the first American spacecraft to land on soil away from the earth.  That same week, Thomas Stafford and Eugene Cernan went into Earth orbit on the Gemini 9 flight.  The two-man Gemini program would end after three more missions in ’66.  Stafford eventually circled the moon in Apollo 10, and Cernan was the last human to walk on the lunar surface in 1972.

How about a day trip from La Crosse to Minneapolis and back?  A chartered bus trip was planned on a Thursday in May.  Leave La Crosse at 7:30 in the morning, arrive in the Twin Cities at 11.  You’d have the whole afternoon free until getting back on the bus at 5:30, and returning to La Crosse at 9 p.m.  There would be brief stops in Red Wing on the way up and back.  Total cost…$5.50.  Cheap travel 51 years ago, 1966, yesterday in La Crosse.