CAPE WOMAN WILL CELEBRATE PATRIOTIC BIRTHDAY

One hundred years ago, the world was a different place. Henry Ford had just built his first automobile, athletes were trying to found the modern Olympic Games and Thomas Edison was opening the precursor to the movie theater, the Kinetoscope Parlor.

And 100 years ago, a Cape Girardeau woman, Laura St. Ann Keller was born on the Fourth of July. Monday, her friends are throwing her a bash.

"It's pretty special to share a birthday with our country, especially when it's your 100th," said Hattie Bohnert, her friend and attendant. "And Miss Keller is a very special lady. She certainly deserves this."

But the birthday girl remains modest.

"Being 100 is no different to me than being 50," Keller said. "I'm the same as always; if anything, it's everything else that's different.

"I don't think that people today are as patriotic as they used to be. People don't know how wonderful this country really is," said Keller.

She devoted her life to serving the community by working toward historic preservation in Cape Girardeau. She worked many years as a member of the Historical Society of Greater Cape Girardeau and was active with the Glenn House acquisition. In 1988, she was honored by the city for her contributions to the community.

Keller was born on July 4, 1894, in Redding Ridge, Conn. Several years ago, she returned to visit the house where she was born. The owners said they were told never to shoot fireworks at the house because a baby was once born there on the Fourth of July.

When she was 6 years old, her parents moved to Malden, where her father became publisher of the Dunklin News newspaper. The family moved to Cape Girardeau in 1918.

"I remember when I was little I used to have a choice on my birthday," Keller said. "We could have fireworks or watermelon. I usually picked watermelon."

Keller attended many universities while pursuing her career of teaching English, speech and drama. She graduated from Teachers College in New York in 1926. Then she taught vocal music at Southeast Missouri State University for seven years before moving to New Brunswick, N.J. She moved back and forth between there and Cape Girardeau until 1967, when she retired and returned to this city.

"Cape is my home," she said. "My parents were here and I knew I had to come back."

For almost 20 years, she lived in a historic home that she had renovated and called Westlane. When she sold the home in 1991, she moved into Chateau Girardeau.

At the Assisted Living Center in Chateau Girardeau, Keller stays busy. She reads, goes for walks in the garden and tells jokes to her neighbors.

"She's an inspiration for everyone who lives here," Bohnert said. "She's sharp and she has a great sense of humor. I always tell her she's a real firecracker."

There will be a birthday reception for Keller from 2-4 p.m. Monday at Chateau Girardeau's Assisted Living Dining Room, 3120 Independence St. The reception is open to all friends and acquaintances of Keller, but gifts are not necessary.