Out of the past: Jan. 13

2000

Two administrators with the Jackson School District have submitted their resignations to the school board; assistant superintendent Terry Gibbons has been named superintendent of North St. Francis School Board in Bonne Terre and associate superintendent Fred Jones is retiring.

JEFFERSON CITY – State Sen. Peter Kinder will head the committee charged with writing the Missouri Republican Party’s 2000 platform; the state party announced membership of the 11-member panel Tuesday; they were chosen by state GOP chairwoman Ann Wagner.

1975

Engines won’t turn over, as some remember they had forgotten to have their automobiles winterized; the frigid weather adds to the misery of getting up to go to work on a Monday for many Girardeans; thermometers plunge into the low teens early in the morning as the second day of an Arctic air mass grips the area; the chill triggers a sharp boost in natural gas consumption here that almost approaches the daily allocation for Missouri Utilities Co.

Missouri Utilities Co. officially announces plans to lay off approximately 10% of its work force, or an estimated 50 positions; utilities president Ray W. Call says that all departments will be affected by the layoffs.

1950

The 1950 infantile paralysis fund drive is launched in Cape Girardeau to replace money used in the 1949 polio epidemic, the worst in history; with sights set on a $10,000 county goal, opening guns are fired when campaign officials place in the mail 6,000 letters addressed to previous donors of Cape Girardeau and the immediate vicinity; chairman of the county drive is Lindsay W. Simmons.

Continued rain is bringing a severe surface water problem in many sections of Southeast Missouri, with drainage ditches overflowing or running bank-full; that is the main problem in the south end of Dunklin County, where a number of families in the vicinity of Hornersville have been evacuated to the former Army air base at Malden; Cape Girardeau Red Cross chapter dispatches 40 cots and 80 blankets to the airfield to be used in the housing program.

1925

With the burning this morning of the fourth barn in less than six weeks, officials suspect a “firebug” is active in Cape Girardeau, and police are investigating the origins of the blazes; this morning’s fire, at 2:45, is in a barn at the home of Henry Vogelsang, 814 Independence St.; for a time it threatens residences and other buildings in the immediate vicinity; the blaze wasn’t discovered by neighbors until it had enveloped the barn.

A fleet of 10 trucks, consigned to the Regenhardt Construction Co., arrived in Cape Girardeau yesterday and will be put to work at once on the firm’s big state road contract in Bollinger County; the trucks, which are of the Hug make, designed an…d built by a road contractor especially for that kind of work, cost approximately $18,500; the trucks will be used to haul concrete and stone and other road-building eateries to the scene of the building activities on Highway No. 9, west of here.

Southeast Missourian librarian Sharon Sanders compiles the information for the daily Out of the Past column. She also writes a weekend column called “From the Morgue” that showcases interesting historical stories from the newspaper.