Other than when it was used for filming part of the movie Friday Night Lights a couple years back, the Astrodome has been sitting empty and unused for a few years now. It had seemed a shame that the original domed stadium – the “Eighth Wonder of the World” has been relegated to this rather ignoble end. The hosting of the New Orleans refugees is a great use for the “grand old man.”

For this stadium to go out on such a high note is actually quite touching. After decades of serving up entertainment such as Elvis, Muhammed Ali, Evil Knievel, the 1968 UCLA-Houston college basketball game, a couple presidents, and even the famous “Battle of the Sexes” between Billy Jean King and Bobby Riggs, it has been tossed aside by the larger, flashier, newer, and costlier Reliant Stadium.

As lives and property are recovered and the pieces are put back together, it is good to know that in what may be its final show, the Astrodome has hosted its most important guests in a long career of public service.