BUSINESS MEMO

JACKSON -- Edward D. Jones & Co. will observe the grand opening of its new office at 810 E. Jackson Blvd in Jackson May 14.

"We'll have an open house from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.," said Dave Beasley, a Jackson investment representative of Jones, which is headquartered in St. Louis.

A ribbon-cutting will be held at 11 a.m. at the office.

Door prizes will be presented, including a set of four tickets to a St. Louis Cardinal baseball game at Busch Stadium.

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GRANITE CITY, Ill. Glik Stores, a 96-year-old apparel chain, has received the Levi's "Retailer of the Year."

The award is presented to two stores in a six-state region and is based on overall volume increase, overall visual improvement and working relationship.

The local Glik's store, Glik's Ltd., is located in West Park Mall.

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MARBLE HILL Crader Distributing Co., of Marble Hill, has been named "Distributor of the Year" by Stihl, Inc., based on Crader's sales accomplishments during 1992. Crader also received the top award for Stihl Full Force Cleaning System sales.

Crader was in competition for the award with 14 other Stihl distributors across the country.

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JACKSON Commerce Bank of Southeast Missouri will open its Jackson facility Monday at 9 a.m.

David Kemper, chairman and CEO, Commerce Bancshares, and Warren Weaver, vice chairman, Commerce Bancshares, will attend a special ribbon-cutting ceremony Tuesday at 10:30 a.m.

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The Pasta House Company has introduced its new "Light Menu" pasta dishes and dinner entrees.

The new menu offers low fat, low calorie and low cholesterol Pasta House's food, including linguine and spaghetti, entrees of pepper chicken breast, and poached holland sole in a lemon garlic sauce.

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Dennis Marchi of Jackson has been named to the Boatmen's Bank Board of Directors.

Marchi is manager of Schnuck's Food and Drug in Cape Girardeau. He has served as Schnucks manager since 1985.

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My Daddy's Cheesecake, 111 N. Main in downtown Cape Girardeau, has been selected for inclusion in a forthcoming book devoted to cataloging specialty foods identified with a specific locale or culture.

The book, "Home Town Specialties," by Laura Dale, formerly of St. Louis and now living in West Des Moines, Iowa, also includes a chapter on Oberle Sausage from Ste. Genevieve.

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ST. LOUIS - Boatmen's Bancshares Inc. has purchased an Overland Park, Kan. bank.

The bank holding company acquired the First Continental Bank & Trust of Overland Park Tuesday. The purchase is Boatmen's first acquisition in Kansas, said Andrew Craig III, Boatmen's chairman and chief executive officer.

Boatmen's Bancshares is one of the 30 largest U.S. bank holding companies.

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BRANSON - Wal-Mart Inc. will build a 147,000-square-foot Supercenter in this Ozarks tourist town that will employ 400 people when it opens by fall 1994, the company said.

The grocery and general merchandise store will be built at the junction of Missouri highways 76 and 13. Cost of construction, scheduled to begin this fall, was not announced.

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CHICAGO - Sears, Roebuck and Co. today reported its best first-quarter results ever, a $435 million profit, due in part to cost cuts in its retailing division.

Despite a 13 percent decline in merchandise sales, the Sears Merchandise Group produced a profit.

Chicago-based Sears reported corporate earnings for the period of $435 million, or $1.13 a share compared with a loss of $1.6 billion, or $4.54 per share, in the first quarter of 1992.

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MARION, Ill. - Some of the 160 GTE North telephone operators who will lose their jobs when the company closes two Southern Illinois offices are asking GTE to stay.

"We have an excellent office and excellent employees, so we tried to get them to rethink this," said Colleen Smith, who has worked at GTE's Marion center for 16 years.

GTE announced in January it will close service centers in Marion and Carbondale in 1994 as part of a restructuring plan. Spokesman Jim Manis said there was no reason to believe the company would change its plans.