Out of the past 11/7/10

25 years ago: Nov. 7, 1985

Downtown Cape Girardeau's Rivertown Center, a minimall at 5 N. Main St., which has been closed for several years, will reopen this weekend under the new ownership of Delores Luton.

The Veterans of Foreign Wars post here, currently named for Cape Girardeau's first World War II casualty, Lloyd Dale Clippard, will be renamed to honor veterans of the Korean and Vietnam conflicts as well; the name will change to the Clippard-Wilson-Taylor Post, honoring Richard G. Wilson, who was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously for action in Korea, and Robert L. Taylor Jr., the only member of the VFW post here to be killed in Vietnam.

50 years ago: Nov. 7, 1960

Cape Girardeau County voters, perhaps as many as 20,000, stirred by contests on national, state and local levels, will mark their ballots tomorrow; voters will choose between Richard Nixon and John Kennedy for president.

What promises to be a brief city council meeting blossoms into a full discussion of the condition of Independence Street; John H. Hayden, commissioner of public works, initiates the discussion, saying every Missouri Pacific Railroad crossing in the city is in poor condition and needs to be repaired.

75 years ago: Nov. 7, 1935

Evangelist Billy Sunday, who preached two great campaigns in Cape Girardeau, in 1926 and again in 1933, died last night at the home of relatives in Chicago; he was 72.

A group headed by Festus J. Wade Jr., of St. Louis, recently acquired from the First National Bank in St. Louis 25 farms in Scott County, embracing a total of 4,200 acres, all in cultivation; the deal was handled by Clyde A. Vandivort of Cape Girardeau, who will operate the farms.

100 years ago: Nov. 7, 1910

A smaller crowd than normal attends the Cape Girardeau City Council meeting, with the big Republican rally offering more entertainment than city business; the council instructed police chief Willis Martin to provide at least one additional officer at each polling place during tomorrow's election.

The Rt. Rev. Daniel S. Tuttle, bishop of Missouri, has presented the vestry of Christ Episcopal Church a list of three ministers from which the church will chose its next rector; until a rector is chosen, Walter Siffer will act as lay reader for the church.

-- Sharon K. Sanders