Out of the past: Feb. 7

1998

Representatives of Missouri's Department of Transportation and the company that designed the Bill Emerson Memorial Bridge met with local government officials here yesterday to quell rumors about the bridge's design and safety; they'll answer the public's questions Monday at an open house meeting at the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce office; rumors about the status of the bridge have been flying since the construction contract with Flatiron Structures Co., LLC., was dissolved in December after Flatiron dug a hole to begin construction of Pier 3 in the middle of the river and discovered fissures in the rock filled with mud and clay.

The Show Me Center, Radio City Music Hall, Madison Square Garden, the Pontiac SilverDome and Seattle's Kingdome are among the winners in a magazine poll of the best entertainment facilities in the U.S.; the Show Me Center was one of 26 entertainment venues to be honored by the Prime Site Awards, given annually by Facilities Management.

1973

Cape Girardeau's tentative plan for gradual opening of New Madrid Street as an east-west thoroughfare across the city has run into another hurdle; as City Street Department employees cleared a new section for extension of the street from North Henderson Avenue west to Illinois Avenue, another part built in 1971 through Southeast Missouri State University property has to be closed because of a dirt slide from North Sprigg Street at Emerald west to North Henderson; the dirt comes from a fill which was placed on top of a spring on a side of the hill just south of the street.

Rearrange your lockers, national guardsmen; you will soon be sharing it with national "guardswomen"; Col. James R. Crites, commanding officer of the 135th Engineer Group in Cape Girardeau, announces the National Guard is now open to females.

1948

Little respite appears in sight for weather-besieged Girardeans, who are told by forecasters to be prepared for light rain today and clearing and much colder temperatures tonight and tomorrow; packed snow and ice still cover most of the highways and roads in the district.

Near complete development of Harris Field into a municipal airport during the spring and summer months appears probable with receipt by Mayor R.E. Beckman, on behalf of the Municipal Airport Board, of a letter informing him that the Civil Aeronautics Authority has made a tentative allocation of $67,565 for development of the port; voters approved a $115,000 bond issue last spring, and the board has already expended $46,000 of the bond issue; $40,000 was for the purchase of land and the remainder was for improvements to hangars and other buildings at the field.

1923

The Frisco Railroad moves to force the payment of charges assessed against the Cape Girardeau Northern Railroad for handling freight; A.W. Sander, chairman of the light and water committee of the city council at Jackson, is notified by the Frisco freight department that coal shipped over the Frisco and switched to Jackson by the C.G.N. would not be delivered unless the city power company guarantees the payment of all freight charges; three cars of coal, now in Frisco's Cape Girardeau yards, will remain there, unless the city council assures Frisco it will pay all per diem charges for the cars.

Cape Girardeau city officials are negotiating with a Kansas City, Missouri, company preparatory to a visit of a representative of the company here Feb. 19, when the proposal to buy a street-sweeping machine for the city will be discussed at length; at present there are about 18 miles of paved streets in Cape Girardeau, which are swept by six men; the workers aren't able to sweep their allotted streets daily, and in parts of town the streets are being swept only three or four days a week.

-- Sharon K. Sanders