Out of the past: April 15

1990

Easter Sunday. Centenary United Methodist Church holds a sunrise service at Riverfront Park, followed by a breakfast in the church social hall served by the United Methodist Men.

Authorities say a short circuit and explosion in an electrical control panel were responsible for a two-alarm fire late Friday that heavily damaged a production line at the Atlas-Alchem Plastics Plant here; the fire occurred in the plant's No. 3 building, at 1 Atlas Drive, west of Broadview Street, near Arena Park.

1965

A 50-foot radio antenna to help extend the range of Cape Girardeau's Federal Aviation Agency Flight Service Station is being installed by three men from the FAA Systems Maintenance District Office in Indianapolis; it will replace a short antenna perched 20 feet off the ground on the airport's terminal building roof.

Cape Girardeau police chief Irvin E. Beard refuses to make department records available to reporters investigating the arrest of a man, charged last week in Scott County on a peace disturbance complaint; Beard tells reporters from The Missourian and KGMO radio that the case is out of his department's jurisdiction, and he didn't think it proper to release the arrest information.

1940

The new Cape Girardeau City Council makes a number of appointments, but few changes in the personnel of city departments; in one change, R.B. "Bob" Oliver III, junior associate of the Oliver & Oliver law firm, is appointed city attorney; he succeeds B. Hugh Smith, who, however, is retained as special city counsel to prosecute the merchants' license cases.

A condemnation suit in federal court, through which the government is to take title to the Wayne County courthouse and the county jail at Greenville, Missouri, is continued to May 1 in a formal order made by Judge George H. Moore.

1915

The second day of the official clean-up campaign finds Cape Girardeau's streets dotted with piles of rubbish to be hauled away by city workers; street commissioner Henry Brunke kept his wagons going all day yesterday picking up trash, but they didn't begin to cover the whole town.

Professor L.R. Johnson, teacher of horticulture at the Normal School, is out on the streets again after undergoing a most serious surgery; Johnson is looking fine and expects to be as strong as ever in a short while.

-- Sharon K. Sanders