Would you vote for a president named Mo?

Arizona Congressman Morris ‘Mo’ Udall was running for president in the 1976 election, and he made an early campaign visit to La Crosse in late 1975. Udall came three months after former Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter made a La Crosse stop. Udall called himself the ‘most believable candidate.’ He told local Democrats that they would probably see a lot of him before the April primary. Udall’s narrow loss to Carter in Wisconsin was considered the last straw for his campaign.

UW-L chancellor Kenneth Lindner took his master plan for the campus to a Student Senate hearing in ’75. Senate president Jim Hill said the students probablt wouldn’t want to build an ice arena on campus, if they would have to pay an extra $15 a year fee to build it.

Hal Holbrook was appearing on TV as Abraham Lincoln, in a series of six specials about Lincoln’s life, leading up to America’s 200th birthday. And Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner lent their voices to a TV cartoon special based on their popular routines about ‘The 2000 Year Old Man.’ That was 44 years ago, 1975, yesterday in La Crosse.