Out of the past: March 8

1994

After hearing testimony from several concerned citizens and church leaders against the development of a go-cart track, the Cape Girardeau Council last night allowed the matter to die for a lack of a motion; earlier in the day, several council members attended a decibel test conducted by Southeast Missouri State University physics professor Richard Cannon at the proposed site, the corner of North Kingshighway and Lexington.

The Cape Girardeau Board of Education is looking for a two-part tax issue, with one vote planned for June and a second for November; in June voters would be asked to waive Cape Girardeau's 37-cent Proposition C rollback, and in November the board would ask for an $8 million bond issue to build a new elementary school at the Sprigg and Bertling site.

1969

Application for a charter for a fourth bank in the city -- the Missouri State Bank of Cape Girardeau -- was filed yesterday in Jefferson City with the Division of Finance by a group of businessmen; LaRoy R. Roper, president of United Oil Co., is named in the application as the president of the proposed bank, and Charles N. Harris is designated as chairman of the board.

L.W. McDowell, city superintendent of parks and recreation, says that horseback riding in picnic areas of Arena Park has left some of the sites unfit for family recreation; signs in the park restricting horseback riding to the roads have been torn down.

1944

Marine Staff Sgt. Burnell C. Bowers, 23, a Cape Girardeau boy, is missing in action in the South Pacific war area; Bowers is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Emory Bowers of Collinsville, Illinois, and formerly of Cape Girardeau and Oak Ridge; he is married to the former Juanita Sides, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Pearl Sides of Cape Girardeau.

Another pre-induction call for 35 white men to go to Jefferson Barracks on March 30 has been received by the Cape County Selective Service Board; the call brings to 418 the total of men called or to be called for pre-induction during March.

1919

MOREHOUSE, Mo. -- Mill No. 1 of the Himmelberger-Harrison Lumber Co. here is destroyed by fire in the morning, causing a loss of several thousand dollars; the fire started in the engine room and burned fiercely, threatening the entire plant and a portion of the town.

Robert Harrison, son of Mr. and Mrs. W.H. Harrison, who left here for France last spring with Company L, returned home last night; he was in service over 10 months and was wounded in the battle of the Argonne Forest.

-- Sharon K. Sanders