Out of the past: March 3

2000

“Millie never knew a stranger. She was your friend if you just had a minute,” says Mary Frances Kinder, a longtime friend of the Limbaugh family; Mildred “Millie” Limbaugh died yesterday at her Cape Girardeau home at the age of 74; the matriarch of a prominent Cape Girardeau family, her husband, attorney Rush H. Limbaugh Jr., died Dec. 8, 1990.

It has been suggested that the River Heritage Museum should move out of Cape Girardeau’s old fire station and become part of the proposed River Campus museum; the River Heritage organization would become a society whose members would support the River Campus museum and even volunteer their time to help staff it, says Jerry Ford, a member of the River Campus Board of Managers.

1975

William Street from Kingshighway to Plaza Way is blocked to traffic in the morning to allow the contractor to dig a trench for the west end sanitary sewer replacement line that will run under the street; the one-block portion of William will be closed three or four days.

BENTON – The 1-month-old United Farmers movement gets another big boost in the evening when 125 farmers meet here and agree to support the movement by taking some of their land out of production in an effort to force prices up; farmers from four Southeast Missouri counties and others in Southern Illinois attend the Scott County organizational meeting.

1950

The City of Cape Girardeau is weighing the problems and possibilities of constructing a main trunk sanitary sewer line from Independence Street through Arena Park, which would serve residents of Rodney Vista and to be ample to care for future growth of the area; in addition, a separate, Kingshighway sewer line is being considered to serve Cape Rock Drive and businesses along the highway.

Plenty of sunshine and no rain the past few days have brought a considerable fall in the stages of both the Mississippi and Ohio rivers; as a result many families driven from the Bird’s Point-New Madrid Floodway by two flood threats in two months are finally returning to their homes.

1925

Weather permitting, Cape Girardeau’s 1925 paving program, expected to be larger than that of 1924, will get underway within the next 30 days; Haas and Keller, local contractors who have the West End Boulevard paving project in addition to a number of smaller ones awarded last year, are preparing to start as soon as winter is over; in addition the City Council will consider paving Pacific Street, from College to Elm Street, and Spanish Street, from Broadway to Independence.

One hundred and twenty arrests were made by Cape Girardeau police during the month of February, or an average of four each day, reports Police Chief Arthur S. Whitener; total revenue collected from fines for the month amounted to $829.75, with considerable money yet uncollected.

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.