You could call it “Airport ’77,” but it was no disaster movie…40 years ago

In May of 1977, the La Crosse airport was considering repairs to two runways which were becoming worn out.  One plan called for paving the runways with concrete.  That might cost $6 million, but the repair work would last about 20 years.  A cheaper alternative would be an asphalt surface, that might only hold out for five years.
 
Was the La Crosse school district holding out on the public?  School board chairman William Temte says no cover-up was intended, when the district failed to publicly release a study of the need for a new Logan High School.  The report had been given to the Logan principal in April…of 1976.  The principal had sent copies to the school board office, and assumed that the board members had seen them.  But in those 13 months, the only administrator who had actually read the report was Superintendent Eugene Balts. 
 
The original ‘Star Wars’ opened in the U.S. 40 years ago this week.  It replaced a thriller called ‘The Car’ as the number one movie in America, and held the top spot at the box office for 10 weeks, between May and October.  Other films which reached number 1 during that period included the Disney cartoon ‘The Rescuers’ and ‘The Spy Who Loved Me,’ with Roger Moore as James Bond.  That was in 1977, yesterday in La Crosse.