Out of the past: Sept. 6

1999

Labor Day. Volunteers raise money for Jerry’s Kids in the annual Muscular Dystrophy Association Telethon, this year broadcasting from Lowe’s Home Improvement Warehouse; the last reported total for the Cape Girardeau area is $341,124, up from the $324,915 reported for 1998.

It will be an inconvenience for a while, but once the work at the Fruitland interchange is complete, traffic in the area will be less congested; work has begun on the interchange, which is set to get five lanes that will go all the way from U.S. 61 to Highway 177; the area connects traffic to major roads such as U.S. 61 and Interstate 55; there also is some bridge work in the area that has to be done because of the extra weight of additional lanes.

1974

A cooperative agreement between Cape Girardeau and Scott counties creating a Southeast Missouri Regional Port District was tentatively accepted yesterday by a six-member subcommittee from within the counties’ two port authority advisory committees; approval of the agreement is one of several steps necessary in requesting Missouri Department of Transportation approval for forming a regional port authority in Cape Girardeau County.

Parking will be prohibited in the future on both sides of New Madrid Street from North Sprigg to North Henderson, the section of the street which runs across Southeast Missouri State University property; the city police department’s traffic division has said parking on the narrow street presents traffic hazards.

1949

Two armed posses, made up of farmers and livestock owners and using foxhounds, make an early morning drive in the northeast part of the county, combing a 1,000-acre sector of the Lovejoy Valley district, in search of vicious animals which have been killing livestock there and elsewhere; the drive was brought on by the attacks of some type of vicious animals, which in the past two weeks killed four goats and a 250-pound hog on the E.V. Kester farm, four miles north of Cape Girardeau, and four hogs on the L.P. Crites farm in Lovejoy Valley, and also maimed three more hogs there; two more of Crites’ 70-pound shoats are missing.

Paced by an expected large increase at Central High School, Cape Girardeau public school enrollment jumps 100 pupils over the figure for the first day of classes a year ago; the count this morning is 2,617 pupils.

1924

The business men of Marble Hill and Lutesville, the twin towns of Bollinger County, have shown their progressiveness and cooperative spirit by joining in a community enterprise that will mean much to both towns and to the entire county; they have a commercial club which has bought about 10 acres of land lying between the towns, known for years as Cowan’s Grove; this they have turned into a community park and a tourist camp with well water and electric lights.

The steamer Cape Girardeau, carrying a large list of round-trip passengers, arrives here in the morning; the extremely cool weather the past few days apparently hasn’t daunted excursionists in the least; a new orchestra, from East St. Louis, Illinois, has taken the place of Peg Meyer’s musicians aboard the steamer.

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 semissourian.com/history.