WORK UNDER WAY ON CITY MURAL

JACKSON -- The Clabaugh Building downtown is getting more than a new coat of paint this week.

Matt Chubboy of Coast to Coast Signs was hard at work painting Jackson's new mural Tuesday morning on the north wall of the building at 102 S. High St.

The work should be done by the weekend, said Herb Wickham, a Jackson artist and chairman of the city's mural committee.

"We're tickled to death with it," Wickham said.

The mural will be "unveiled" during the Homecomers festival, he said.

Old Hickory himself -- President Andrew Jackson, for whom the city was named -- is already recognizable at one end of the mural, which faces the Cape Girardeau County Courthouse.

Grant Lund, a long-time Jackson resident and art professor at Southeast Missouri State University, designed the mural, which will also feature a blacksmith, the courthouse, a Homecomers scene and old-time musicians.

Chubboy scanned the artwork for the mural into a computer, divided it into a grid pattern and then reproduced the grid onto the wall. Each 12-inch square contains a piece of the overall work, and all 12 colors in the design have been assigned a number.

"Now it's essentially paint-by-number," he said.

The wall itself has been the "biggest challenge," Chubboy said.

"On a flat surface you don't have the grooves, like you do here between the bricks," he said. "The depth of the mortar is an eighth of an inch to a half-inch deep, so that you have to pile the paint in there."

Chubboy, also a Jackson resident, said he hears a lot of questions and comments from passers by.

"I told my wife it seems like I do just as much time talking to people as I do painting," he said. "It seems like there's a great deal of pride in the city with the mural going up."

David Clabaugh, the owner of the building, agreed.

"I think there was a lot of enthusiasm when we got this mural," he said. "I think it's generated a lot of pride in the community."

Clabaugh said he's always liked the murals in downtown Cape Girardeau, so he volunteered his building, which is about 90 years old.

"I felt like we have a prime location right here across from the courthouse," he said, adding people visiting the courthouse or traveling through the downtown area will get a good look at the new mural.

Wickham said the mural committee has spotted potential sites for future downtown murals.

"The mural committee's going to stay active 'til we run out of juice or 'til we run out of space," he said.

Lund's design was one of 19 submitted for the mural in a contest sponsored by the committee and the Arts Council of Southeast Missouri.