Stories from Monday, December 12, 2022

PORTAGEVILLE, Mo. — Missouri 149th District Rep. Don Rone readily remembers how he felt when he walked into the Missouri State Capitol as a newly-elected legislator. Stepping onto the House floor to be sworn in, Rone said he looked around at the rows of wooden desks, marbled columns and stained-glass windows...

Retiring Republican U.S. Sen. Roy Blunt, who has represented Missouri in Congress for 26 years and in the Senate since 2011, will deliver remarks at the 2 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 17, fall commencement at Southeast Missouri State University's Show Me Center...

EquipmentShare will employ between 20 and 30 full-time employees at its new Cape Girardeau location, according to Meg Judy, deputy director of public relations and communications for the Columbia, Missouri-based firm. Judy said the company, founded in 2014, has repurposed the former Republic Waste material recovery facility on the Rambler Drive site, describing EquipmentShare as "a nationwide construction solutions ecosystem provider that solves industry 'pain points' through smart jobsite technology and equipment rental, retail and service distribution.". ...

Prekindergarten students received beanies made from yarn based on their own design on Friday, Dec. 9, at Jefferson Elementary School in Cape Girardeau. Julie Ray, a retired Early Childhood professor who volunteers at Jefferson, said she introduced the students to the picture book "Extra Yarn" in October...

I'll see your true color shining through. Don't be afraid to let them show — your true colors are beautiful, like a rainbow. — Cyndi Lauper, "True Colors" At first blush, American pop singer Cyndi Lauper's hit 1986 song has little to do with the U.S. workforce and people using their own abilities and skills to fit into an employment situation...

A Cape Girardeau man died in a one-vehicle crash Saturday morning, Dec. 10, north of Chaffee, Missouri. Devin Fitzgerald-Patterson, 27, was southbound on Highway 77 when the 2022 Hyundai Elantra he was driving ran off the right side of the road and struck a bridge, according to a state Highway Patrol report...

Trevor Pulley sat in his first floor City Hall office in Cape Girardeau, looking out the eastward-facing windows to see downtown and the muddy Mississippi River below. It's one of the "best views in town," he said, made possible by those in the community working together. It's a view he admires but doesn't plan on spending time enjoying...

The oldest Protestant house of worship west of the Mississippi River that is still standing is tucked off of the Interstate 55 Business Loop and Old Orchard Road Drive just outside of Jackson. What was once a “chapel in the woods” is now, as McKendree Memorial Chapel Board of Directors president Mary Harriet Talbut says, a chapel surrounded by a subdivision on one side and an interstate and connecting roads on another. ...

Today is Monday, Dec. 12, the 346th day of 2022. There are 19 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On Dec. 12, 2015, nearly 200 nations meeting in Paris adopted the first global pact to fight climate change, calling on the world to collectively cut and then eliminate greenhouse gas pollution but imposing no sanctions on countries that didn't do so...

O Heavenly Father, thank you that your Holy Word is everlasting. Amen.

Too bad Paul Whelan is not Black or gay or someone who openly hates America. Too bad he's white, male and a former U.S. Marine. Otherwise, he would not still be rotting in jail in Russia on trumped-up espionage charges. Also otherwise, Whelan would have been the American prisoner in Russia who was exchanged last week by the Biden administration for Viktor Bout, aka "The Merchant of Death"...

The Respect for Marriage Act, codifying same-sex marriage as federal law, already decided as such by the Supreme Court in the Obergefell decision in 2015, has now passed the Senate and the House, and President Joe Biden will sign it into law. Let's take a moment and consider what is going on...

There's simply no other way to put it: Death by suicide is a tragic, gut-wrenching experience for families and friends. And for the individual, it's such an unnecessary ending to life. Recently, Southeast Missourian reporter Danny Walter wrote about efforts by local organizations to address the issue. He noted that in 2018, the most recent year data was available, there were 17 deaths by suicide in Cape Girardeau County. That's 17 too many...

City of Cape Girardeau Community Development Department has received two applications for business licenses: n John J. Stockton of Festus, Missouri, for Salon Store, 825 Broadway, opening in early 2023. n Chellnecia Webb of Fort Wayne, Indiana, for United Pride Tax Solutions, 89 S. Plaza Way, anticipated opening Jan. 2...

Jackson Area Chamber of Commerce will host two events this week: n Business After Hours -- 5 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 13, at Kimbeland Country Club, 2175 E. Jackson Blvd. Host is First Class Travel. n Business Breakfast -- 7:30 a.m. Friday, Dec. 16, at Jackson Civic Center, 381 E. Deerwood Drive. Sponsor is Reed's Metals. The breakfast will be carried via Facebook Live...

Ethan McMillan of Cape Girardeau has received a Sigma Pi Fraternity Alpha Iota Education Foundation (AIEF) financial award. McMillan, a mechanical engineering student, a freshman at Missouri University of Science and Technology at Rolla (Missouri S&T), received $1,500 via the Dr. Richard "Dick" Miller scholarship...

Jonathan W. Nauser, PhD, has joined Saint Francis Behavioral Health-Poplar Bluff as a clinical psychologist.

Roundabouts, reported a Missouri Department of Transportation flyer, "reduce driver delay by allowing motorists to yield rather than stop and can also handle higher traffic volumes, especially at intersections with many left turns." MoDOT traffic engineers were present last week in Cape Girardeau County for a public meeting to explain the finer points of an estimated $2 million planned roundabout for Highway 25 and Route K in Gordonville, with anticipated completion by December 2023...

The debut Kid's Business Fair will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 17, at Jackson's Elks Lodge, 542 W. independence St., and the public is invited. Parent organizer Melinda Arends said there will be 27 booths, staffed by children aged 5 through 18...

City of Jackson will submit an application for Local Tourism Asset development funds administered through the state Department of Economic Development on behalf of two organizations: Jackson Area Chamber of Commerce and Uptown Jackson Revitalization Organization...

Pump prices continue their steady fall as demand for gasoline remains low, according to auto club federation AAA. The average U.S. price for gas on Saturday, Dec. 10, was $3.29, down 13 cents in one week, down 51 cents in the past month and 4 cents cheaper than one year ago...

Restaurant approvals were announced Nov. 29 by Amy Morris of the Cape Girardeau County Public Health Center: Mireya's Mexican Food Truck, Tasty Snow Crabz, Paradice Concessions, The Munch Box, Pulse Fitness and Nutrition, Water & William Olive Oil, El Sol Mobile and Tree Top Saloon...

Tree Top Saloon, 4946 County Road 532 in Pocahontas, advertised on Facebook as a performance and event venue with a bar and food offerings, expects to open later this month. Tree Top's most striking feature is the business literally is a tree house sitting approximately 25 feet in the air at its highest point...

Century Casinos, which broke ground May 26 for a new six-story, 69-room hotel at its Cape Girardeau property at 777 Main St., held a Dec. 2 groundbreaking on its new land-based $59.1 million casino and hotel development in Caruthersville in Pemiscot County, Missouri...

Vellarie "Judy" Bowen, 79, of Millersville died Friday, Dec. 9, 2022, at her home. She was born Jan. 9, 1943, in Loudon, Tennessee, to Clifford and Rose Fagg Stephens. She and Arnold G. Bowen were married April 21, 1957, at Corinth, Mississippi. They moved to Millersville from Orland Park, Illinois, in 1972...

HONOLULU -- Scientists lowered the alert level for the Mauna Loa volcano on Hawaii's Big Island from a warning to a watch on Saturday and said the mountain's first eruption in nearly 40 years may soon end. The U.S. Geological Survey's Hawaiian Volcano Observatory said in a bulletin that the eruption on the mountain's northeast rift zone was continuing, but lava output and volcanic gas emissions were "greatly reduced."...

INVER GROVE HEIGHTS, Minn. -- At least 13 bald eagles were likely poisoned by scavenging the carcasses of euthanized animals that were improperly dumped at a Minnesota landfill, and three of the majestic birds have died. The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that state and federal wildlife officials are investigating after the eagles were found this month near the Pine Bend Landfill in the Minneapolis suburb of Inver Grove Heights...

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. -- Heavy snow fell in the Sierra Nevada as a winter storm packing powerful winds sent ski lift chairs swinging and closed mountain highways while downpours at lower elevations triggered flood watches Sunday across large swaths of California into Nevada...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- Iran said Monday it executed its second prisoner detained amid the nationwide protests now challenging the country's theocracy, airing footage on state television it claimed showed him stabbing a man to death and running away...

MADISON, Wis. -- A not-for-profit group that became a point of controversy for distributing hundreds of millions of dollars in election grants during the 2020 presidential campaign is releasing a fresh round of money to local election offices, including in states where Republican lawmakers tried to ban the practice...

FRANKFORT, Ky. -- Chris Bullock has a lot to be grateful for as she decorates her new home for Christmas, after spending much of the past year in a camper with her family. One year ago Saturday, a massive tornado obliterated wide swaths of her Kentucky hometown of Dawson Springs, leaving her homeless after a terrifying night of death and destruction...

MEXICO CITY -- It is one of the world's most visited and beloved religious venues -- the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, with a circular, tent-shaped roof visible from miles away and a sacred history that each year draws millions of pilgrims from near and far to its hilltop site in Mexico City...

NEW YORK -- Drought in California meant Raquel Krach, a rice farmer and graduate student in the Sacramento Valley, planted very little. Using groundwater, she and her husband planted 75 acres this year to maintain their markets. The rest of the 200 acres she typically sows remained empty due to an inadequate water supply...

WASHINGTON -- Young voters who have been critical to Democratic successes in recent elections showed signs in November's midterms that their enthusiasm may be waning. a potential warning sign for a party that will need their strong backing heading into the 2024 presidential race...

SAN RAFAEL VALLEY, Arizona -- Work crews have steadily erected hundreds of double-stacked shipping containers topped by razor wire along Arizona's remote eastern boundary with Mexico in a bold show of border enforcement by Republican Gov. Doug Ducey even as he prepares to leave office...

KYIV, Ukraine -- Russian forces have turned the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut into ruins, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, while Ukraine's military on Saturday reported missile, rocket and air strikes in multiple parts of the country that Moscow is trying to conquer after months of resistance...

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- NASA's Orion capsule made a blisteringly fast return from the moon Sunday, parachuting into the Pacific off Mexico to conclude a test flight that should clear the way for astronauts on the next lunar flyby. The incoming capsule hit the atmosphere at Mach 32, or 32 times the speed of sound, and endured reentry temperatures of 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit before splashing down west of Baja California near Guadalupe Island. ...

WASHINGTON -- A Libyan intelligence official accused of making the bomb that brought down Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988 in an international act of terrorism has been taken into U.S. custody and will face federal charges in Washington, the Justice Department said Sunday...

When she was 19, writer Emily Maloney found herself facing about $50,000 in medical debt after hospital treatment for a mental health crisis. The debt followed her throughout her 20s, hurting her credit and leading to stressful calls from collection agencies...

Hate mealy apples and soggy French fries? Science can help. Restaurants, grocers, farmers and food companies are increasingly turning to chemistry and physics to tackle the problem of food waste. Some are testing spray-on peels or chemically enhanced sachets that can slow the ripening process in fruit. ...

Coronavirus-related hospital admissions are climbing again in the United States, with older adults a growing share of U.S. deaths and less than half of nursing home residents up to date on COVID-19 vaccinations. These alarming signs portend a difficult winter for seniors, which worries 81-year-old nursing home resident Bartley O'Hara, who said he is "vaccinated up to the eyeballs" and tracks coronavirus hospital trends as they "zoom up" for older adults, but remain flat for younger folks...

Here's a collection curated by The Associated Press's entertainment journalists of what's arriving on TV, streaming services and music and video game platforms this week. ...

Until recent years, military bands in Ukraine had never heard John Philip Sousa's classic march "Stars and Stripes Forever"; Col. Jaroslav Gorbal, chief conductor for military bands in Ukraine, has some catching up to do; the uniformed Gorbal was at Southeast Missouri State University yesterday to conduct a rehearsal of the university's Symphonic Wind Ensemble; Dr. ...

PERRYVILLE, Mo. — Charles W. Gibbar, 92, of Perryville died Thursday, Dec. 8, 2022, at The Estates of Perryville. Visitation will be from 10 to 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Dec. 17, at Ford and Young Funeral Home in Perryville. The funeral will be at 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Dec. 17, at the funeral home, with Deacon Derek Hunt officiating. Burial will be at St. Rose of Lima Catholic Cemetery in Silver Lake, Missouri...