PROGRESS MEANS END TO FAMILY FARM

For Emil "Jim" Meyer, the price of progress is paved with sadness.

Construction of Lexington Street is taking part of his family farm and the brick house at 2010 Perryville Road in which he has lived for most of his life.

"I'm sure going to miss this place," Meyer said Monday as he stood outside his home.

From his front porch, Meyer, who turned 79 today, can see Lexington Street being built just to the west of Perryville Road, inching ever closer to his home. The road will eventually extend across Perryville Road on eastward across the Meyer property, connecting to an existing section of Lexington on the eastern boundary of the farm.

In all, the city is taking slightly less than four acres of the Meyer farm. But, in reality, it's much more than that in terms of family memories.

"It's really torn me up, torn me to pieces," said Meyer. "That's the sad part about it, losing my home."

He said he believes the city could have avoided taking his house, skirting the house by running the route across part of his neighbor's property on the southside as suggested by that neighbor. But that didn't happen.

He said the city is paying him for the house and acreage. But for Meyer, the house means more to him than money.

"I don't think they could have paid me enough for what the home means to me," he said.

His parents lived in the house, built about 1920, and he grew up there.

Meyer said the city has given him until Aug. 14 to move out of the house.

Originally, he had talked of building a new home on what was left of his farm. But his wife, Hildreth, to whom he was married for 43 years, died Dec. 22, 1989.

Meyer said he has no desire now to build a new home. Instead, he plans to move in with a sister, Helen Meyer, who lives nearby.

Meyer plans to auction off many of his belongings, from antique furniture to horse-drawn plows. The auction will be held June 27.

Meyer said he and his brother, Martin, used to farm together. But his brother died five years ago.

At one time the Meyer farm was home to about 100 head of livestock.

It's still home to about 25 head of beef cattle. But two-thirds of the cattle are owned by a nephew and will be moved to the nephew's Cape Girardeau area farm. Meyer said he plans to sell the remaining cattle.

"I guess my farm is probably the last one in this part of the city," he said.

At one time the farm covered about 176 acres. Over the years Meyer sold off much of the land for residential subdivisions, including the Northfield subdivision and the Meyer Drive area.

Today the farm covers only about 50 acres, virtually surrounded by houses.

The farm has been in the Meyer family since at least the early 1900s, but it has been farm land for more than a century.

In 1850, 175 acres of tobacco grew on the farm, tended by slaves, Meyer said.

Meyer was born in a log house built by Green Hobbs, an Indian who was named after the family that adopted him.

The house still stands on the farm near the soon-to-be-built Lexington route. But time and the elements have taken their toll on the structure.

"It's all rotted out," said Meyer, as he surveyed the dilapidated structure, which sits in a low-lying area of pasture land. The house is now used strictly to store hay.

But at one time, he recalled, it was a nice farm home, as a painting of it in his Perryville Road house shows.

Meyer still plans to cultivate his extensive garden just to the north of his house. The Lexington route won't take his garden.

"All I did was plant it," he said. "The good Lord has done the rest of it."

Over the years the Meyer farm has been a familiar landmark, one that neighbors have enjoyed.

"I've got so many people around here who say, `Don't leave, we like to watch your cattle.'"

Meyer recalled that many of the children who grew up in the neighborhood would call out, "Hi, Mr. farmer," when they saw him out working on the farm.

While he wishes the Lexington route had bypassed his home, Meyer remains philosophical about his predicament.

"If we would all look at things alike, the world would stop turning around," he said.

"I know I have to make the best of it, taking it as it comes."