The “Queen” was coming to town, 53 years ago

 
The La Crosse Queen paddlewheeler was being introduced in 1965.  Roy Franz of the Big Indian Boat Lines said the new excursion boat could hold as many as 150 passengers.  Franz had been offering river trips in La Crosse for three years before the Queen’s first tour.  The boat would arrive in La Crosse after a 10-hour trip up the river from Prairie du Chien.  
 
Memorial Field might have to be moved, to allow the state university in La Crosse to grow.  A new campus heating plant was part of the expansion project, along with the physical education building, Mitchell Hall.  The La Crosse city council had been talking for some time about possibly building a new football stadium in the marsh.  
 
Four women had been turned down as candidates to become U.S. astronauts.  By May of 1965, only seven Americans had gone into space, with Gus Grissom the only man to do it twice.  That spring, Barbra Streisand did her first TV special, and the La Crosse Tribune said “feminine viewers (would be) interested” in a fashion salon segment on the show.  Space travel versus fashion?  That was 53 years ago, yesterday in La Crosse.