This Month in Rochester History

February 1962 was a quiet month in Rochester. Not much was happening, except that there was a lot more snow on the ground than we have today.  One thing that did make the front page of the newspaper was the school board's decision to spend $19,000 to install language labs in the high school and the two junior high schools, Central and West.  The audio equipment for the labs was purchased from the Dictaphone Corporation.  Up until the beginning of the 1961-62 school year, Rochester students were only offered two years of foreign language instruction, and they had their choice of French or German. The district added a third year of instruction to the curriculum in 1961-62, and after ordering the language labs, planned to offer a fourth year beginning in 1962-63.

I remember sitting in the language lab at Rochester High School, practicing phrases played on a state-of-the-art reel-to-reel tape deck. Anybody else?