The announcement by the National Science Foundation that the former Homestake Mine in Lead was its choice for a national underground science lab is the reader's pick as RapidCityJournal.com's top story of 2007.

It edged out the execution of Elijah Page for the 2000 murder of a Spearfish man. Page was the first person to be executed in South Dakota in 60 years.

The Homestake story received 592 votes, or 41 percent, in an online poll of the finalists that ran from Sunday through Wednesday. The Page execution received 496 votes, or 34 percent.

The summer storms that flooded homes in Hermosa and Piedmont finished third with 194 votes, or 13 percent, and the Alabaugh Fire near Hot Springs that killed one and destroyed a number of homes finished fourth with 174 votes, or 12 percent.

The four finalists were selected by online readers during a series of online polls last week that featured 20 of 2007's biggest stories.

The online poll differed somewhat from the Journal's choice of the Top 10 stories of 2007 featured in the Dec. 30 print edition.

The Journal's pick for top story was the Page execution, and the runner-up was the Alabaugh Fire.

The Journal's No. 3 story for 2007, Sen. Tim Johnson's recovery from a late 2006 brain seizure, failed to make the finals in the online poll prelims, getting knocked off by the August flooding in Hermosa and Piedmont. That story finished No. 7 in the Journal's list.

The Homestake lab story, which online readers picked No. 1, finished No. 4 on the Journal's list.