The weather on Groundhog Day was a dooooozy, 22 years ago

The city of La Crosse has had plenty of cold weather this winter.  The weather service says the two weeks right after Christmas marked the coldest two-week period in town since 1996…and that winter was pretty chilly.  The mercury stayed below zero from January 29th through February 4th, 1996…seven straight days.  And the worst of it came at the end of the streak.  On Groundhog Day, February 2nd, the low in La Crosse was -34 degrees…followed by -36 on the 3rd, and -31 on the 4th.

La Crosse and Onalaska were still fighting over dueling annexations in early 1996.  Judge Michael Rosborough ruled that Onalaska’s “Pralle” annexation of land near Valley View Mall was valid, while La Crosse’s “Schroeder” annexation of the same property was invalid.  The two cities had been fighting in court for six years, but they settled the dispute later in ’96.  The land eventually became the site of a Gundersen Clinic and the Stoney Creek Inn. 

La Crosse was going through a second straight winter without a CBA basketball team.  The Catbirds had been moved to Pittsburgh in 1994, but by the following fall, the Bobcats would move into the La Crosse Center.  That was 22 years ago, 1996, yesterday in La Crosse.