Out of the Past

The Rev. Larry E. Gallamore is the new pastor at Grace United Methodist Church in Cape Girardeau, coming here from Ellisville, Missouri, in St. Louis County; he replaced the Rev. Ernest Swartz, who is the new pastor of St. Mark's United Methodist Church in Florissant, Missouri...

Carolyn Vandeven, principal at L.J. Schultz Middle School for eight years, has taken a new position with the Joplin, Missouri, public schools; she will be assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction at Joplin. The historic, former Corps of Engineers Dredge Ste. ...

Cape Central Airways won't abide by the second eviction notice sent from the City of Cape Girardeau and will take the matter to court; the company was supposed to leave the airport by Wednesday, and it hasn't done so; Cape Central Airways is the airport's fixed-base operator...

Boyd Gaming Corp. consultant Dan Davis is in Cape Girardeau to help coordinate a petition drive for the 8th congressional District; the petition will seek 20,000 signatures from this district to help secure a gambling amendment on the Nov. 8 state ballot...

Union Electric Co. is working at the William-Sheridan intersection this week to upgrade its gas mains as part of an ongoing project to replace cast iron mains along William Street; UE is installing a section of 10-inch, high pressure, steel gas main beneath the intersection...

The Southeast Missouri University Foundation has backed out of plans to buy a dilapidated, old house so two Cape Girardeau men can obtain it and renovate the structure; foundation officials had considered buying the 90-year-old-house at 534 Washington Ave., at a cost of $24,500 and tearing it down; the property boarders a university parking lot...

Unprecedented attendance, the promise of another generous commitment by Boyd Gaming Corp. and a crowd willing to exercise patience when it was time to leave put a fitting cap on Riverfest 1994; festival organizers are pleased with the two-day festival, calling it a huge success drawing as many as 75,000 people to the riverfront...

The 1994 edition of Cape Girardeau Riverfest opened to a huge crowd Friday night, due in part to ideal weather conditions; but an early afternoon thunderstorm put a brief damper on some of Saturday afternoon's activities, and forced more than an hour delay in the evening's fireworks display...

Dan Milligan, former Cape Girardeau Central High School principal, said Friday his decision to leave school a week before commencement was based on a series of meetings starting six weeks earlier requesting special treatment for one senior; on June 3, Milligan left Central High in protest of a decision to allow seniors who hadn't completed graduation requirements to participate in commencement; he hasn't returned to the school...

Cape Girardeau County Sheriff Norman Copeland, credited for transforming a department in shambles into a first-rate law enforcement agency, announced yesterday he will retire Aug. 1; Copeland was appointed sheriff in March 1986, following the resignation of Dwight Thomas, and was elected to the remainder of that term in November 1988; he won re-election in 1992...

The Cape Girardeau City Council has approved the initial phases of two engineering projects, which could give the city a new, safe water-supply source; the first project is a study of an alluvial well, and the second is a project to design earthquake protection of the water system...

Cape Girardeau Board of Education member Bob Fox is unhappy with a decision allowing seniors who haven't completed requirements to participate in Central High School's graduation ceremony Friday; Supt. Neyland Clark, at the direction of members of the school board, last Friday made a decision that seniors within one unit of graduation, who can prove they are pursuing that final credit, could participate in Central's commencement ceremony...

As of July 1, shoppers won't be able to smoke in the public areas at 13 St. Louis area shipping centers; so far, West Park Mall hasn't joined the no-smoking bandwagon, but it's conceivable it could. Cape Girardeau voters turn down a 37-cent tax increase earmarked for building improvements at the city's schools; the ballot issue loses by 176 votes; the school district asked voters to waive the property-tax rollback provided by Proposition C, the state sales tax for education; the waiver would have added 37 cents for each $100 of assessed valuation.. ...

The Rev. D. Chad McIntosh is the new pastor of West Side Church of God in Cape Girardeau; he graduated in May from Mid-America Bible College in Oklahoma City with majors in pastoral ministry and Bible; McIntosh and his wife, Lynn, have a 3-year-old son, Jacob...

A decision Friday to allow Cape Girardeau Central High seniors who don't meet graduation requirements to participate in the commencement ceremony prompted Central High principal Dan Milligan to take a stand against the move; Milligan, who disagrees with the decision and its timing, Friday removed items from his office, and says he's not sure he'll be back at school next week...

The Missouri Highway and Transportation Department at Sikeston will open bids next week for the removal of asbestos in 11 houses and attached garages that are being demolished to make room for the relocated Highway 74 Mississippi River bridge route through Cape Girardeau; officials with the department say acquisition of all parcels of land needed for the highway right-of-way should be completed by the end of the year...

TAMMS, Ill. -- Ground was broken here yesterday for a $60 million, super-maximum prison, which will employ up to 250 people during construction; when completed, the facility will employ up to 300 and provide an $11-million-per-year payroll; the prison is scheduled to open in the fall of 1996...

Southeast Missouri State University has been selected to participate in a new loan program, beginning in the 1995-96 academic year; the new program will allow students to skip the bank and borrow money directly from the federal government; Southeast is one of 983 schools selected to participate in the new loan program...

EAST CAPE GIRARDEAU, Ill. -- The final section of relocated Route 3 between Thebes, Illinois, and Twente Crossing Road will open to traffic in early August, according to the Illinois Department of Transportation; late this summer, the department plans to begin work to raise large portions of routes 3 and 146 in East Cape Girardeau, Gale and McClure, Illinois...

Ryan Corrigan was recently named director of the summer youth program at Christ Presbyterian Church in Cape Girardeau; he will be assisted by Cheryl Reinagel. Corrigan completed his freshman year at Southeast Missouri State University and plans to attend Covenant Seminary this fall...

Gordonville-Dutchtown Public Water District Number Four should have a second water well in operation by late summer; Jerry Lorberg, president of the district's board of directors, says drilling of the new well began about two weeks ago on a tract of land near Highway 25, at the north end of the water district...

John Mehner and Ma Zhong speak the same language when it comes to economic development; Zhong, secretary-general of Shaoxing, China, visited Cape Girardeau this week as part of a four-member delegation of officials from Cape Girardeau's new sister city...

The Cape Girardeau Planning and Zoning Commission will recommend to the City Council most of the proposals made by Boyd Gaming Corp. to handle increased traffic and the need for additional parking for its casino; however, there will be stipulations that will require further study of traffic on William Street heading northbound onto Sprigg Street and the need to widen William east of Sprigg Street...

Virgil Chirnside is retiring as district manager with Union Electric, after serving 35 years with the company; when he leaves his job May 31, he says he'll "be looking forward to golfing fishing and traveling." BENTON, Mo. -- Thomas Kelly High School Principal Ernie Lawson has been hired as the high school principal at Chaffee, Missouri, for the 1994-95 school year; Kelly's boys' basketball coach, Greg Duigan, is also leaving; he will be a teacher and head boys' basketball coach at Union (Missouri) High School.. ...

As Cape Girardeau police officer Danny Niswonger recovered in a St. Louis hospital Saturday from surgery, fellow officers and members of the Cape Girardeau Fire Department replaced the roof on his house; more than 40 officers and firefighters turned out early Saturday at the Niswonger home, determined to do what they could for their fallen friend...

Parents of school-age children who aren't in compliance with the state school immunization law will find their students barred from entering school when classes begin in late August or early September; that's because of several changes in Missouri's law, one being the elimination of the 15-school-day grace period for parents to have their children immunized according to the requirements...

BENTON, Mo. -- Vote counting in Scott County isn't an exact science, even when the totaling is being done by a $33,000 optic scanning machine; ballots cast in the April 5 election on riverboat gambling were run through the machine twice Friday as part of a statewide recount; the tally came out different each time, and both recounts varied from the election-night totals...

Long-time Cape Girardeau Central High School coach and teacher Mark Ruark has been named one of two new assistant principals for Central High; joining him as assistant principal is Bill Biggerstaff, principal at Chaffee (Missouri) High School; the new principal at the school, Dan Tallent, helped select his assistants...

Doug Richards has withdrawn as a Democratic candidate for Cape Girardeau County associate commissioner of the 2nd District; Richards says he withdrew because there is a possibility he will be moving to a residence in the 1st District. Michael Fichter, a criminal-justice professor at Southeast Missouri State University, has visited Bulgaria twice in the last three years, viewing prisons as he prepares to write about that country's penal system; this fall, he will be back in that part of the world as a Fulbright Scholar, teaching a course on U.S. ...

Citing concerns with the timing of payments and overall safety standards, the City of Cape Girardeau has elected to send Cape Central Airways Inc. an eviction notice; the city is seeking to end a 12-year lease with the company, which is the fixed-base operator for Cape Girardeau Municipal Airport...

Renovation of the heavily-silted, algae-covered Jackson Rotary Lake begins, when Jackson Park Department employees open a valve to draw down its water level; the lake, which was built in the mid-1970s, is in the main city park west of the swimming pool...

At the behest of the Cape Girardeau City Council, members of the city's Parks and Recreation Advisory Board have agreed to look at ways to reallocate capitol improvement funds to start the Washington Park project two years ahead of schedule. Employees of Dumey Excavation Inc. of Cape Girardeau are installing a floodgate at the Union Electric viaduct substation on old Highway 61; the gate will be used for employee traffic into the substation and can be closed if high water threatens the facility...

Cape Girardeau Mayor Al Spradling III, during the City Council meeting, announces members of the newly appointed minimum property standards review committee: Charles Kupchella, Michael Sterling, Brian Shelton, Carol Drummond, Richard Bollwerk, Dorothy Hardy and Barbara Horn; the city staff will be represented by inspection services supervisor Rick Murray...

The congregation of La Croix United Methodist Church breaks ground on its first facility in the afternoon; the property is on Lexington Avenue, two blocks east of North Kingshighway; for more than five years, the congregation has been meeting at West Park 4 Cine at West Park Mall...

JEFFERSON CITY -- Gov. Mel Carnahan and Democratic leaders in the Missouri House and Senate praise the accomplishments of the 1994 legislative session that adjourned last night, even though a health-care reform bill that was a focal point of their agenda failed to win approval; Carnahan blasts insurance lobbyists for "distorting facts," which killed the reform bill...

NEW MADRID, Mo. -- The City of New Madrid is laying out the welcome mat for casino companies looking for a place to dock riverboats; at a special meeting of the New Madrid City Council on Wednesday, members voted unanimously to draft a letter to solicit interested casino and gambling firms to its city...

JEFFERSON CITY -- With two days remaining in the 1994 session of the Missouri General Assembly, Sen. Peter Kinder is at odds with Majority Leader J.B. "Jet" Banks over a concealed-weapons amendment he is trying to have added to a juvenile crime bill; Kinder offered the amendment Tuesday night, and it was immediately challenged with a point of order; Banks protested the amendment wasn't relevant to the bill...

The moon glided in front of the sun yesterday, creating a partial eclipse that turned the sun into a crescent of light; more than 100 people converged on the courtyard between Rhodes Hall and Johnson Hall at Southeast Missouri State University to view the partial eclipse through safe filters and several telescopes; the eclipse bathed the Cape Girardeau area in a noticeably different shade of sunlight...

Lone Star Industries, the Kasten Block plant, Consolidated Grain and Barge and the City of Cape Girardeau all will benefit from a timely financial boost from the federal Economic Development Administration; the EDA has notified the city it plans to pay $425,750 of the $567,670 needed to embark on a flood-recovery project in South Cape; the project involves elevating 2,000 feet of South Sprigg Street from old Highway 74 to the Cape LaCroix bridge...

The Cape Girardeau League of Women Voters is teaming up with the Cape Girardeau Civic Center to launch a recycling education project in step with the national trend; the local League received a $2,500 grant from the League of Women Voters Education Fund in Washington D.C., as part of a cooperative agreement with WMX Technologies and Services...

The Tot Lot at Capaha Park is gone, but not for long; the old playground equipment has been removed to make way for a new, expanded lot at the same location; the new equipment will be handicapped accessible; the Evening Optimist Club has donated $12,000 toward the new playground...

Southeast Missouri State University holds commencement ceremonies at the Show Me Center in the afternoon; 663 undergraduates and 36 graduate students receive their degrees; keynote speaker is Jackson attorney John Lichtenegger. A thousand additional copies of the Southeast Missourian's pictorial history, "Images of the Past in the City of Roses," have been printed and are available for sale at the Missourian offices in Cape Girardeau, Jackson and Chaffee, Missouri; in December, 2,000 copies of the book sold out in two weeks, prompting the reprint.. ...

ST. LOUIS -- Southeast Missouri State University and one of its former fraternities -- Kappa Alpha Psi -- were sued for damages Thursday by the parents of a student who died earlier this year after an alleged hazing beating; the lawsuit was filed in St. Louis Circuit Court by Edith and Boyd Davis of St. Louis, who accuse the defendants of the wrongful death of their son, Michael Alexander Davis...

Fast-food establishments such as McDonald's and Burger King won't be setting up shop on the Southeast Missouri State University campus; the board of regents yesterday awarded a new food service contract to Morrison's Hospitality Group. JEFFERSON CITY -- Legislation to send a constitutional amendment back to voters this year legalizing games of chance on riverboats apparently lacks the support in the House of Representatives to pass; Southeast Missouri legislators all agree the measure is dead for the 1994 session, and if it is to be considered by voters again this year, it will have to be put on the ballot by an initiative petition.. ...

JEFFERSON CITY -- The Missouri Senate yesterday approved a spending plan that includes $12 million for a new College of Business building at Southeast Missouri State University; the building is part of a $250 million bond package proposed by Gov. Mel Carnahan; the bond legislation has cleared the House and could be called this week from the Senate's debate agenda...

Illinois funding for a new Mississippi River bridge here is included in its five-year transportation improvement program contingent upon federal funding; in addition, funding has been set aside for early work on Route 146, which leads from the bridge into Illinois...

The Southeast Missourian's Jackson U.S.A. Signal will become a weekly publication; starting Sunday, approximately 10,000 Southeast Missourian subscribers in Jackson, Fruitland, Gordonville and portions of the rural Cape Girardeau and New Hamburg, Missouri, areas will receive the newspaper; non-subscribers in the Jackson area will receive the publication...

Tom Irwin, executive director of the Missouri Gaming Commission, says under the state's gambling law, riverboat casinos can't float the Diversion Channel; they are restricted to the Missouri and Mississippi rivers; Lady Luck has proposed docking a riverboat on the Diversion Channel at Scott City...

Saint Francis Medical Center is planning a new "one stop" facility, combining doctors offices with medical laboratories and technology on the medical center campus; many of the details are still to come, including square footage and what services would be housed in the proposed addition; plans for expansion at Saint Francis have been criticized by the Southeast Missouri Business Group on Health...

Larry Dowdy, the executive vice president of Little River Drainage District, says his group isn't opposed to having a gambling boat on the Diversion Channel, as long as the project wouldn't damage a levee; several companies seeking to place a gambling boat in Scott City have talked with the district's board of supervisors about using the channel...

Mid-South Steel and Cape Girardeau's sewer system are the direct beneficiaries of $75,000 worth of state emergency flood aid awarded yesterday by the Department of Economic Development; through an Emergency Flood Infrastructure Grant, the city will be able to make sanitary sewer improvements necessary for Mid-South Steel Products to relocate from a flood plain along the Mississippi River to an industrial park here...

The Cape Girardeau Board of Education hires Dan Tallent to be the new Cape Girardeau Central High School principal; the board also hires Timothy L. Niggle to fill the position of director of human resources. Clarence Bahner, an employee of Schearf Plumbing of Cape Girardeau, is left rubbing his head after the dirt walls of a sewer trench collapse on him while installing a sewer line at 2517 Saddleridge; Bahner, who is left buried up to his waist, is rescued by his boss, Jim Schearf, and two Union Electric Co. ...

The late Sue Lusk is honored for her service to Cape Girardeau and Mid America Teen Challenge, exactly one year after her death; she is one of four winners of the 1994 United Way Cybertel Volunteer award; the others are Nicole Wadlington, Dorothy Ressel and Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 10495 at Jackson...

After a long weekend of weighing proposals from two companies interested in developing a riverboat gambling operation in Scott City, its city council gives the nod to Lady Luck Gaming Corp.; Gary Heisel, project coordinator for the company, says it will move promptly to apply for a license from the state gaming commission...

Southeast Missouri State University sophomore Stephen S. Owen leads the morning worship services at Grace United Methodist Church; the title of his sermon is "Love -- God's Eternal Life Preserver"; a political science and criminal justice major at Southeast, Owen is the son of Ray and Sally Owen of Cape Girardeau...

An agreement between Tommy Hilfiger U.S.A. Inc. and Hartmarx for the manufacture of Hilfiger's popular clothing line was announced Friday; all suits and sports jackets in the Hilfiger line will be made at the Thorngate Ltd. plant in Cape Girardeau. A prevailing-wage dispute over the Towers renovation project has been resolved, with the Missouri Division of Labor Standards issuing a wage determination to add an estimated $10,000 to $15,000 to the construction cost...

The National Rifle Association held its first "Friends of NRA" auction and dinner at the Holiday Inn Convention Center in Cape Girardeau last night; around 300 persons attended the banquet, including state Sen. Peter Kinder, who was co-chairman of the event, state Rep. Mary Kasten and members of U.S. Rep. Bill Emerson's staff...