Out of the Past: July 16

1999

The intersection of East Main Street and Shawnee Boulevard should reopen the week after next, says Jackson public works director Jim Roach; the intersection has been closed since the beginning of July for widening and installation of a 10-inch water line; the new intersection will have a right-turn lane on northbound Shawnee; workers also are constructing a large box culvert over the draining stream at the intersection.

Terry Funk, who is pursuing a geography degree at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, has been hired to fill the vacant Project Impact coordinator position; as such, he will oversee Cape Girardeau’s disaster mitigation projects and administer grant money from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

1974

Summer renovation and repair work at Southeast Missouri State University is well underway with the new Student Union and Academic Hall projects taking the greatest portion of appropriated funds; Wayne Norton, public information officer for the university, says the $3.9 million Student Union has a projected opening date of March 1, 1975; renovation of Academic has been underway several years; currently, workers are putting in piping and duct work for heating and central air conditioning; also a new filter system will be installed in the swimming pool, a 900-head sprinkler system will extend throughout the building, and the ceiling will be lowered 6 inches.

A regionalized sewer system serving Scott City, Illmo and other towns within a 30-mile radius would be given higher priority for federal funding than grant applications by each town for individual sewer systems; the suggestion of a regionalized system was made last night during a special meeting of the Scott City Council with Tom Jones and George Howell, field representatives of the Missouri Clean Water Commission.

1949

The Cape Girardeau County Selective Service office, open full time since the act was revived late last summer, expects to be reduced soon to half-time work if an anticipated reduction in appropriations is made by Congress; chief clerk Robert J. Altenthal has been alerted by state headquarters to expect this possibility.

Alfred P. Behrens, 80, former Cape Girardeau city commissioner and city clerk, passed away yesterday morning at a local hospital, where he had been in a critical condition since suffering a stroke June 13; Behrens was forced to retire two years ago when he was stricken with paralysis and had been in failing health ever since; his first business association was as co-owner of the Priest-Behrens Mercantile Co. at Jackson with the late Charles Priest; he and his wife, the former Barbara Ann Priest, moved to Cape Girardeau in 1917, and he became manager of the Glenn Mercantile Co.; Barbara Behrens died in 1941.

1924

Forty-seven hours after she disappeared from her west side home, Mrs. A.S. Boucher, 45, wife of the director of the Teachers College Training School, is found at 1 a.m. by Russell Young near an automobile drive in the “Home of the Birds”, north of the college buildings; she was exhausted and willingly consented to be taken home, where she is rational and isn’t expected to suffer any ill effects from two days and a night of exposure.

Several hundred bushels of newly-threshed wheat were consumed in a fire that swept the barn on the farm of Simon Blattel, three miles south of Kelso, early Monday; the barn was struck by a lightning bolt during the severe electrical storm and all its contents were destroyed, except the livestock, which was saved by the heroic efforts of Blattel and his sons; Blattel’s wheat-threshing machine, usually kept in the barn, was on a neighboring farm to be used that day.

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.