Cape landmark burned in 1902

One-hundred-and-ten years ago last Saturday, the landscape of Cape Girardeau changed. On the night of April 7, 1902, fire destroyed the Third District Normal School, which was as much a Cape Girardeau landmark as Academic Hall is today.

The proud edifice was constructed in 1875, two years after the founding of the Normal School. The building was designed by St. Louis architect J.B. Clarke. William E. Gray of Alton, Ill., built the Normal on land donated by Cape Girardeau contractor Joseph Lansmon. It stood three stories tall with a basement and housed 10 classrooms. It measured 160 feet long by 72 feet wide.

Mark Twain penned a now-familiar description of the building: "There was another college high up on an airy summit -- a bright new edifice, picturesquely and peculiarly towered and pinnacled -- a sort of gigantic casters, with the cruets all complete."

Thirty-five years after the conflagration that destroyed the school, The Southeast Missourian published the accounts of four people who witnessed the tragedy:

Almost immediately following the fire, the Board of Regents asked the state for funds to rebuild. The following year an appropriation of $200,000 for a new structure was approved. Designed by J.B. Legg, Academic Hall now stands on the site of the old Normal, its iconic dome the very symbol of Southeast Missouri State University.