Winona Daily News

In my 23 years in the newspaper business, I’ve probably received more phone calls from people complaining about gas prices than any other topic. And with prices topping $3 a gallon lately, it’s a topic that will continue to be on people’s minds. So with apologies to Sam Spade, here’s an updated version of a column I wrote as a reporter at the La Crosse Tribune in good old 1993, when gas was barely above $1 a gallon.

It was a sweltering night in the city. I was working the night beat. It was a busy night, with the constant chatter of the police scanner an indicator that the denizens of Third Street were keeping the cops busy.

I was sitting at my desk, reviewing some old notes over a cup of bad coffee and thinking about an idea for my next column. Maybe it was the weather or maybe it was the vending machine sandwich I had for supper, but I felt like something was going to break.

I was on the verge of a major scoop. It was just a hunch, but I felt like there was something in the air tonight. Something more than the yeasty aroma the night breezes carried down from the brewery.

The phone rang. I swallowed some java with a grimace and grabbed the receiver.

“City desk. Hardie.”

“Hardie,” the caller continued, “you don’t know me, and I’m not going to tell you who I am. But I’ve got some very important information for you that affects everyone who lives in and around

La Crosse.”

“Whatcha’ got,” I asked, fumbling over some empty Chinese takeout boxes, fast food wrappers and old cop reports to fish a pen and paper out of my drawer.

“Is your phone clean?”

I pulled away from the receiver and flicked off a piece of ear wax. “I dunno.

It’s OK, I guess.”

“Good. Hardie, I have discovered some shocking news.”

“What’s that,” I asked, wondering if it was something really insidious, like a proposal from the city of

La Crosse to make residents of the town of Burns pay for Bliss Road repairs since the city had exhausted the option of charging every other municipality in the county.

“Hardie, did you know that the price of gas is lower in Winona, Minnesota, than it is in La Crosse?”

“Yes,” I said tentatively, hoping this was just the tip of the story iceberg and my mystery man was just warming up. My coffee certainly wasn’t. I took another slug. “So what’s a couple of pennies?”

“Well,” he said. “It’s more than a couple of cents. Last week there was an eight-cent difference.”

Mystery man paused, obviously building drama. I suddenly became more interested in the sludge at the bottom of my cup than in my caller.

“Explain it to me,” I said, stifling a yawn.

“Don’t you understand? If the gas stations in Winona do not raise their prices, they might actually sell more gas. And before you know it, everybody from La Crosse will drive up to Winona to buy gas. I mean, it was bad enough when there was gas station competition in La Crescent just across the river.”

“So what,” I said, not quite being able to picture Hwy. 61 jammed with cars headed to Winona.

“So,” he continued, his voice rising with hysteria, “that might cause the gas stations in La Crosse to fall into a state of competition. With all the worry we have about Iraq, the Middle East, Mel Gibson’s arrest report and the Green Bay Packers offensive line, the last thing we need is to worry about is who has the lowest price of gas in town. I like it the way it is now — everybody charges the same higher price.”

“Get a grip on yourself,” I snapped, sensing the caller to be on the verge of breakdown. “Station owners in the La Crosse area have assured us in the past that they have very little control over the price of gas they sell. The set prices based on what they are told to charge by their wholesalers. And I don’t think those wholesalers are at all concerned about the price of gas in Winona.”

“That’s what they want you to believe,” mystery man said with a sigh of exasperation. “And I suppose you believe the government didn’t know about 9-11 in advance either.”

“Hey, Mac. Don’t pawn off your conspiracy theories to me,” I shot back. But before I could get satisfaction, I was greeted with a dial tone.

Another big scoop down the drain. Based on my queasy stomach, that’s where I should have dumped the coffee. It goes with the territory. Sour stomachs, sleepless nights. We don’t work these gigs for the glamour or the money.

I cradled the phone. On the scanner the cops had pulled over another drunk. It was the witching hour on Third Street. It was past midnight and the presses were rolling in the basement, turning out the morning paper.

I took one last swallow of old coffee, brushed some crumbs off my keyboard and began to write my column.

“It was a sweltering night in the city ... ”

Chris Hardie is publisher of River Valley Newspaper Group’s weekly newspapers and shoppers.

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