Although the Nash Road Industrial Park is 39 years old, it is far from complete.

The park has more than 20 industries and businesses in a complex south of Cape Girardeau, alongside Nash Road and near Interstate 55. Those businesses provide employment to more than 1,500 workers.

The first business to settle in the park -- ABF Freight System Inc. -- is still in business 35 years later.

A number of the industries have been around long enough to be familiar names -- General Sign, in the park's first speculation building, Biokyowa, Spartech, Golden Cat, Midwest Agri-Chemico Inc., Jerry Lipps Trucking.

There are others. The two newest are Botkin Lumber and M & H Pallet. M & H moved to the park within the past six months, in the Moon Distributing building. Moon Distribution had been a fixture in the park since 1969

The Nash Road Industrial Park started in September 1959 when a small development group -- The Greater Cape Girardeau Development Corp.-- was founded. Twenty-five chamber members invested $625 to form the corporation, and the first land was acquired in 1962 -- a 160-acre parcel.

By 1984, the corporation had 432 stockholders and had acquired an additional 500 acres.

The group underwent some changes recently, going from a profit organization to a non-profit group.

The name has been changed, said Chamber president and chief executive officer John Mehner.

The new organization -- The Greater Cape Girardeau Area Benevelopment Association -- includes all the stockholders of the former development corporation and some new members.

The industrial park on the west side of I-55 has more than 800 acres. The Scott City Industrial Park is on the east side of the Interstate.

Two years ago, Nash Road Industrial Park became 240 acres larger when the Greater Cape Girardeau Development Corp. purchased land adjacent to the Cape Girardeau Regional Airport, about a half-mile from I-55.

"This is ideal property for development," said Mehner, an officer of the development corporation. "It has an airport, river and railroad access. With the extension of Nash Road to the Southeast Missouri Regional Port, the property is in a great location."

Part of the new acreage is included in the Cape Girardeau County Enterprise Zone, which provides tax benefits to businesses by promoting investment and new jobs in the zone. Utilities and water services are available on the property, which has total highway frontage on Nash Road of 3,960 feet.

A lot of activity is going on in the overall park.

BioKyowa announced plans in January 1998 for a major expansion of its swine and poultry supplement manufacturing plant.

Four months later, Biokyowa announced it would establish a food supplement plant to be completed during the summer of 2000.

This all tabulates into more than $85 million in expansion and a creation of another 80 jobs.

Biokyowa is a subsidiary of parent company Kyowa Hakko of Tokyo.

Spartech also expanded its operation at the park last year, leasing a speculation building for warehouse space.

The St Louis-based manufacturer with two operations in Cape Girardeau -- Spartech Compounding in the industrial park and Spartech Plastics at 2500 Spartech Drive, is using the 200-by-300-foot, 60,000-square-foot building at 4901 Nash Road for a warehouse.

Spartech, a producer of engineered thermoplastic materials, polymeric compounds and molded and profile products, has more than 36 plants and annual sales of more than $700 million.

And, more industries are being recruited to the park.

Mitch Robinson, executive director of the Cape Girardeau Area Recruitment Association, works with the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce and the City of Cape Girardeau to attract industry to the area.

When talking to prospective businesses, Robinson tells them of the advantages of moving to the area, and he doesn't restrict his conversations to just the Nash Road Industrial Park.

"We try to promote all of the industrial parks in the area," said Robinson. "One park may not have what they are looking for but another will be to their liking."

Among advantages in the Nash Road area, is a central location with easy access to railways, airport and river.

All of the industrial parks can offer training resources through Southeast Missouri State University and the Cape Girardeau Area Vocational-Technical School and an area quality workforce that is skilled but affordable.

Other immediate area industrial parks are Six Thirty Industrial Park, 730 Industrial Park, Cape West Business Park, and Rust Avenue Industrial Park, all in the immediate Cape Girardeau area; Perryville Industrial Park at Perryville; Scott City Industrial Park; Lang Industrial Site, Meyer Industrial Site and Seabaugh Industrial Park, all in the Jackson area, and the Southeast Missouri Regional Port Authority in Scott and Cape Girardeau counties.

Most of the 20 industries operating in the Nash Road Park are solid companies, Mehner said.

They include

Biokyowa, a Japanese firm that produces swine feed supplement pellets, and is in the process of building a plant to produce human food supplements.; Spartech, compounding and compounding warehouse; Golden Cat Corp./RXI plastics, a manufacturer of cat litter/cat litter containers; ABF Trucking; American Freightways; and Jerry Lipps Trucking.

Also included are Midwest Agri-Chemico Inc., Q.C. Corp., G.C.I.D. Sewage Lagoon, Hardware Wholesalers Inc, Botkin Lumber, General Sign, SEMO Box, Clarklife, Motorcycle Stuff, Truck Transportation Inc., M & H Pallet and Rugby Corp.