Fred Lynch retired in 2018 after capturing images for the Southeast Missourian since 1975, in that time moving from black-and-white to color, from film to digital and to video. The blog title is a nod to an earlier era of news photography and the 4x5 Speed Graphic: It's more important to be there for the shot than to worry about technical details.

Double Slide at Capaha Park

Posted Monday, August 16, 2010, at 7:30 AM

There was a time when the city park playground was a more dangerous place than today.

This picture by G.D. Fronabarger shows a double slide at Capaha Park near the corner of West End Boulevard and Normal Avenue. It is undated, but probably taken in the 1950s.

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more dangerous? looks like a lot of fun...maybe kids had more common sense back then...i don't know.

but i don't think the park is any safer nowadays...more thugs and pervs hanging out there...

-- Posted by TommyStix on Mon, Aug 16, 2010, at 8:26 AM
I remember as a youngster going down that slide, and having a blast. But you couldn't have one now due to the goody two shoers, and their lawyers wanting to get rich quick. Back then, getting hurt was part of the fun!!!

-- Posted by billsheppard52@gmail.com on Mon, Aug 16, 2010, at 9:27 AM
I went down that slide many times as a child. Part of the fun was knowing that if you fell from the top, you were gonna get hurt. It did not help that my cousin and brothers would sometime try to push you down the slide before you were ready, but that just added to it!

-- Posted by jcwill on Mon, Aug 16, 2010, at 10:06 AM
We'd bring a sheet of wax paper with us to slide down on. After a couple of trips down, that thing would be turbocharged.

-- Posted by ksteinhoff on Mon, Aug 16, 2010, at 11:23 AM
Of course, if you got as far as the slides, you MUST have gone on to climb on Rosie, the Capaha Park train.

http://www.capecentralhigh.com/cape-photos/cape-girardeau-parks-are-well-trained...

http://www.capecentralhigh.com/cape-photos/parks/hooligans-deface-train/

-- Posted by ksteinhoff on Mon, Aug 16, 2010, at 11:25 AM
Wow. Such memories!!! I love these blogs, Fred! Got any on Bloomfield Road when it was spooky and basically undeveloped? The trees made a canopy over the road that even in daylight the road was dark.

-- Posted by Leenda on Fri, Sep 3, 2010, at 9:20 AM

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