DONATION FURNISHES UNIVERSITY MUSEUM'S NEW `PERIOD ROOM'

Rubye and Donald Kraft grew up in Cape Girardeau County, then had government careers that took them around the globe. They also were collectors, of anything from Victorian silver to military memorabilia to fine furniture.

After retiring in 1975, they returned to Cape Girardeau because they still had family and properties here. Rubye operated an antique store in downtown Cape Girardeau for a number of years but no longer.

That is how the Krafts came to donate $25,000 worth of 18th and 19th century furniture to the University Museum.

"We really were trying to find a nice home for it," Rubye says.

The Krafts have donated the furniture that is now on display in a "period room" at the University Museum. The 18th century pieces include a chest on a stand, two chest of drawers and a hepplewhite chair.

From the 19th century are a dumb waiter, a Queen Anne table and a Louis XV pier mirror.

All the furniture is made from walnut burl veneer.

Other items include a portrait by English painter Joseph Gordon, 19th century engravings of London scenes and a "lesghi-style" Pakistani rug.

Donald was born in Cape Girardeau and graduated from Central High School in 1938. He attended Southeast and met Rubye before World War II intervened. He returned after the war with an Army commission.

He worked initially as an auditor at an Army fort. After getting out of the Army and finishing his law degree, he worked for the General Accounting Office in Chicago and Washington, D.C., for the Defense Supply Agency in Alexandria, Va., and for the Office of the Inspector General.

It was the last job that required extensive travel throughout the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Africa, the Far East and Latin America.

In Afghanistan, he reviewed U.S. attempts to reduce the poppy crops. In Montevideo, Uruguay, he was escorted from the plane by armed guards because the Tupermoro rebels had killed a foreign adviser. Donald was there to observe how the police forces were being used.

Rubye grew up at Indian Creek and worked for the Department of the Army in Germany, Chicago and at the Pentagon. She was a management analyst in the office of the assistant chief for Force Development when she retired.

In Washington, they found an upscale antique dealer who received containers of goods from England. This was the source of the furniture.

"I was the world's greatest shopper," Donald said.

Their travels also supplied their collections. Vintage jewelry, gold coins and anything from the Napoleonic era and the Civil War interested him, along with porcelains and figurines.

She favored Victorian silver, antique boxes, Limoges china and vintage silver.

University Museum Director Dr. Jenny Strayer said the exhibit will be fleshed out with exhibits of silver, china and decorative arts. Kris Hartman, a graduate student in human environmental studies, is helping develop the exhibit.