‘We as a nation are in very serious trouble’…a campus warning, 51 years ago

Shortly before the 1968 presidential election, an editorial in the La Crosse State College ‘Racquet’ called candidates Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, and George Wallace ‘little more than a very bad joke.’  It claimed the ‘people’s candidates’ were defeated by balloons, bullets, and billyclubs…apparent references to the Chicago Democratic convention, and the assassination of Bobby Kennedy.  

On the same day Senator Kennedy was buried in 1968, the man suspected of killing Martin Luther King was captured.  James Earl Ray was arrested in London, while carrying a Canadian passport with an assumed name.  The La Crosse Tribune called the timing of Ray’s arrest and the RFK funeral ‘ironic justice.’   

A report on enrollment predicted that the La Crosse university campus would grow by 50 per cent within a decade.  There were 6000 students on campus in ’68…but the enrollment didn’t reach the 9000 mark until the early 80’s.   

Homecoming at Mitchell Hall in 1968 featured the duo of Peaches and Herb, who had a major hit 10 years later with the song ‘Reunited.’  A big show on campus, yesterday in La Crosse.