Out of the past: May 16

1994

Cape Girardeau Mayor Al Spradling III, during the City Council meeting, announces members of the newly appointed minimum property standards review committee: Charles Kupchella, Michael Sterling, Brian Shelton, Carol Drummond, Richard Bollwerk, Dorothy Hardy and Barbara Horn; the city staff will be represented by inspection services supervisor Rick Murray.

After a quarter-century of guiding the Notre Dame High Bulldog baseball squad -- a tenure yielding six trips to the state finals and three state championships -- Jim Glastetter plans to spend next season sitting in the bleachers rather than on the bench; next season, current assistant coach Greg Muench will assume the helm.

1969

About 75 employees of Central Packing Co., don't report to work at the request of plant officials who, anticipating a strike, haven't arranged to have work for them to do today; the workers, members of Local 99 Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workers of North America, reportedly authorized their negotiating committee to strike at a meeting last night, but the earliest a strike can begin is May 22.

Twice wounded previously in service there, a Cape Girardeau Marine was killed Sunday in Vietnam as a result of hostile action in his third tour of battlefield duty for which he had volunteered; S. Sgt. Ervin J. Emrick Jr., 29, was fatally wounded by small arms fire in company-sized action in a search-and-clear mission.

1944

A War Department message to Mr. and Mrs. T.M. Hinkebein of near Blomeyer Monday reported their son, S-Sgt. Glen L. Hinkebein, a gunner serving on a bomber, missing in action as of April 29; he was based in England, flying combat missions over Europe.

Registering its sharpest fall, the Mississippi River dropped 18 inches at Cape Girardeau during the 24-hour period ending at 8 a.m. and virtually retires to its banks in all of the city with the exception of the Smelterville suburb west of the Frisco railroad track; the stage here is 34.6 feet.

1919

William Willeke, an 84-year-old resident who came here from Germany in 1860, dies in the morning as the result of shock from a fall he took Monday evening, while attempting to cross Broadway to visit an old friend; he stumbled on the curbing, fell and dislocated his hip.

The Auto Tire Parts Co., owned by the Cotner brothers, just east of the Park Theater on Broadway is becoming a national institution; Barrett Cotner, the founder, conceived the idea of buying up used cars and making a stock of the parts usually needed; within a short time, he had secured the important parts of many cars no longer manufactured and of cars changed in design; Cotners now advertise in national trade journals they can supply parts of most any type of car ever made and at reasonable prices.

-- Sharon K. Sanders