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.

Downtown Christmas shoppers

Posted Monday, December 13, 2010, at 7:30 AM

We can tell it's the Christmas shopping season in this photo taken downtown on Main Street in Cape Girardeau by G.D. Fronabarger. It was probably in the late 1950s.

A 1958 city directory lists these stores that are visible: J.C. Penney Co., 5-7 N. Main; J.J. Newberry, 11-15 N. Main; Schiff's Big Shoe Store, 17 N. Main and Graber's, 19 N. Main.

Penney and Graber's were department stores. Newberry was a 5-cent to $1.00 store.

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I remember the Newberrys in Poplar Bluff when I was a kid. We went to the dentist there in the early 60's and always stopped there to eat lunch at the lunch counter there and then shop at the store. I always loved the toy and pet dept...

-- Posted by johnboy25 on Mon, Dec 13, 2010, at 10:33 AM

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