Out of the Past: June 14

1999

It was months in the making, but the panelists last night all agree that a forum on diversity couldn’t come at a better time; the People-to-People forum was planned long before the June 11 melee on Good Hope Street, but it became the focal point as the place to begin to bring about better community relations; about 50 persons gathered at the Show Me Center to participate in a discussion of how to bring better communication between people with diverse backgrounds; the event was co-sponsored by the Cape Girardeau Chamber of Commerce Multicultural Committee and Southeast Missouri State University.

Cape Girardeau and Southeast Missouri State University are considering a traffic circle or roundabout to improve safety to motorists and pedestrians at the Sprigg Street, Washington and Normal intersection; the university has agreed to pay half the cost of the improvements, with the city paying the other half.

1974

For a second time, the Cape Girardeau Public Library Board of Trustees has turned down a proposal to remodel the Marquette Hotel into a library facility; saying the town’s population is not in the hotel area, the board is considering four or five sites “farther west”; the idea of the old building being remade into something other than a hotel isn’t new; in recent years it has been considered as the location of a Lutheran boarding home or as an office building.

Saint Francis Hospital receives a gift of $15,000 to purchase new equipment for its Nuclear Medicine Department from the McDonnell Douglas Personnel Charity Trust; the gift from the St. Louis-based corporation’s employee trust, originally earmarked for new equipment for the new Saint Francis Medical Center’s Nuclear Medicine Department, may now be used to purchase the equipment at this time and then be transferred to the new hospital upon its completion.

1949

As a premature July 4 celebration seems to have gotten underway in Cape Girardeau, city officials issue a stern warning against the discharging of firecrackers in the city; the police have received several complaints from motorists about children tossing firecrackers and small torpedoes into moving automobiles; city attorney Albert M. Spradling Jr., declares offenders will be arrested, pointing to a city ordinance that makes it unlawful to discharge fireworks in the city limits.

At a meeting yesterday, the State College Board of Regents promoted professor A.G. Williams to head the department of industrial arts, succeeding Kenneth L. Bing, and appointed Wayne Thurman to the faculty in the speech department, where he will succeed professor O.M. Skalbeck.

1924

Two men have a narrow escape from death this morning, when the southbound Frisco passenger train crashes into their automobile at the Kingshighway railroad crossing, four miles south of Cape Girardeau; the men — Gilbert Lehman, shoe repairer, and Willie Philly, quarry worker — escape uninjured by leaping from the car, a Saxon seven-passenger; but the auto is ground to pieces, and wreckage is strewn along the railroad right-of-way for nearly 1,000 yards; a dense fog prevented the men from observing the locomotive until it was only a few yards away.

Joel T. Nunn, president of the Cape Girardeau Building & Loan Association, has resigned that position because of poor health; the board of directors accepted the resignation and elected Fred A. Groves to fill his unexpired term; Nunn was elected a director of the board in 1886 and president in 1901.

Southeast Missourian librarian Sharon Sanders compiles the information for the daily Out of the Past column. She also writes a blog called “From the Morgue” that showcases interesting historical stories from the newspaper. Check out her blog at www.semissourian.com/history.