Out of the past: Oct. 21

1999

The parking problem on the 126-year-old campus of Southeast Missouri State University surfaced again yesterday at a strategic planning forum at Dempster Hall; the school’s president, Dr. Ken Dobbins, told about 100 faculty, staff and students he hopes to secure federal and state money to build a parking garage at the site of the band practice field; but the project can’t move forward until synthetic turf is installed at Houck Stadium, providing the band with an alternate place to practice.

Former University of Missouri basketball coach Norm Stewart took in the practice of the Southeast Missouri Sate University’s hoop squad yesterday at the Student Recreation Center; Stewart was in Cape Girardeau because of his close relationship with Southeast coach Gary Garner, who was an assistant under Stewart at Missouri from 1977-81; the two have remained friends, often seeking each other out for advice.

1974

The Cape Girardeau County Board of Realtors – appearing before the County Court in the morning and the county Planning and Zoning Commission – says county zoning should be implemented before “excessive restrictions” are imposed upon residential developers through adoption of the commission’s proposed land subdivision and mobile home park regulations; the Realtors list several items they consider fallacies in the 77-page land plan proposal.

The issue of public housing in Chaffee isn’t quite dead, but a tabling motion passed by the City Council momentarily deflates its proponents; the expected fireworks don’t burst forth when the council passes the motion by a four to three vote resolving that “public housing will not be brought up until the first meeting of next year”; instead, the council moves on to consider the natural gas bidding situation, the second major issue to preoccupy Chaffee.

1949

A broken gear brought The Southeast Missourian’s big 24-page printing press to a halt shortly after starting yesterday afternoon’s final run, but the fortunate circumstance of being able to print the paper at Cairo, Illinois, enabled the newspaper to reach its thousands of subscribers in Cape Girardeau, Jackson, Chaffee and Oran early in the night; the Cairo Evening Citizen’s press is the same as the Missourian’s; The Missourian plates were slipped onto the Citizen’s press and the run started; however, because the Cairo press is of 16-page capacity, two runs were required to print The Missourian’s 20 pages; for that reason The Missourian’s mailroom force and nine carrier boys were taken to Cairo to insert the two sections.

The Marquette team of French Boy Scout leaders, tracing explorations of Fathers Marquette and Joliet on the Mississippi River, were greeted by a large crowd at the Cape Girardeau waterfront when they pulled in with their duffle-filled canoes at 5 yesterday afternoon; they will stay here two days and depart early Sunday on the next leg of their trip, which will put them in New Orleans about Dec. 9.

1924

The suit to throw the $3,000,000 A.J. Matthews & Co., Inc., farming corporation of Southeast Missouri into the hands of a receiver is taken under advisement by Judge C.B. Paris in Federal Court here; testimony in the suit brought by W.L. Holt, a holder of a $3,000 note against the corporation, to place the farmland in a receivership and secure an accounting of the actions of the officers made, is completed shortly before noon.

Switching service in the terminal of the Cape Girardeau Northern Railway here was resumed yesterday; the service was suspended more than three weeks because of a defect in the line’s lone locomotive, which a government inspector ordered out of service until repairs were made; more than 25 carloads of freight, including coal and gasoline, were handled in the terminal yesterday; during the time switching service was suspended, some shippers on the line moved their products with the aid of automobile trucks.

Southeast Missourian librarian Sharon Sanders compiles the information for the daily Out of the Past column. She also writes a weekend column called “From the Morgue” that showcases interesting historical stories from the newspaper.