Natalie Followell thinks it's neat Bill Clinton selected Cape Girardeau to kick off his presidential campaign.

"I'm excited about it," said Followell, a sixth-grade student at Nell Holcomb School. "I have a cousin that works in the White House, across from President Clinton. I'm excited about Clinton's visit here. I hope I get close enough to shake his hand."

Followell, daughter of Brad and Debbie Followell, was looking for an uncle to help her nudge closer to the platform, where President Clinton, his wife, Hillary, and Vice President Al Gore and hid his wife, Tipper, would later appear.

Followell was just one of hundreds of students who appeared at the afternoon rally in Capaha Park, which attracted thousands of people.

Carol Clinton was there from Puxico, with a group of sixth-grade students.

"People always ask me if I'm related to the president," said Carol Clinton. "I'm not."

Shirley Schweitzer, elementary principal at Puxico, said the school district also sent two high school classes.

Also on hand were four busloads of students from the Poplar Bluff School District. Students from a number of Southeast Missouri school districts attended the rally.

"We wanted students to have a chance at seeing a `sitting' president," said Sarah Long, an administrator at Poplar Bluff.

"I think everyone should see a president," said 12-year-old Jeri Stueven of Dexter, who accompanied her mother, teacher Rhonda Stueven to the rally. Also with the Steuvens was Andrew Steuven, 9.

"I think it's pretty cool," he said.

More than 100 nurses, members of the Missouri Nurses Association, were in the crowd.

"I never thought I would see a president," said Sandy Cobb, of Ste. Genevieve. "Clinton is a big supporter of nurses. His mother was a nurse."

Accompanying Cobb from Ste. Genevieve were nurses Cindy Kreitler and Helen Miner. "We also have nurses here from Cape Girardeau, Columbia and St. Louis," said Miner.

Dale J. Kensil and his wife, Patricia, of Springfield, Ill., chanced getting a ticket to see the Clinton-Gore crowd.

"My wife is a big fan of Clinton's," said Kensil. Mrs. Kensil called the Southeast Missourian newspaper in Cape Girardeau to get all the details.

"That's when we found out we had to have tickets," said Kensil. "We decided to take a chance."

Paul Stepp took care of the ticket problem.

Stepp and Kensil met outside a Cape Girardeau restaurant and started talking.

"I'm a retired carpenter at Springfield," said Kensil. "I'm a member of the carpenter's union there.

Stepp, of Greenbriar in Bollinger County, is a pipefitter and member of Pipefitters Local 562 in Cape Girardeau. He made a couple of telephone calls and came up with two tickets for the Kensils.

Stepp, his wife, Susan, and children, Heather and John, were present for the rally. "We've been in line here an hour, but it's worth it to see Clinton.

Susan LaPierre and daughter, Leigh, agreed.

"I wouldn't have missed it for anything," said Susan LaPierre, who stopped at a vendor's stand to purchase some Clinton-Gore political buttons.

One group of four, from Fredericktown, discovered at the last minute that tickets had been left at home. The group did get to see the president, but not from the vantage point that their brown tickets would have permitted.

The gates opened at about 11 a.m., but the crowd started gathering as early as 9, almost five hours before the appearance of the president.

At one point, a half-hour before the presidential entourage appeared, youngsters in the crowd were doing the "macarena," a popular dance.

A few people in the shoulder-to-shoulder crowd suffered from heat exhaustion and had to be carried away on stretchers.

"I thought I was going to faint," said one high school student, "but, I kneeled down for a while and the feeling passed."