SENIORS BAKE FOR TEEN-AGERS

Seven women at Jackson Manor spent Wednesday afternoon making 144 muffins for this morning's annual breakfast held by the Jackson High School senior class. Wednesday morning, eight women at the Cape Girardeau Senior Center delivered 140 cupcakes they had baked to children at the nearby Christian School for the Young Years.

It was an intergenerational baking day.

The women at Jackson Manor had a bit of help from Martha White, whose strawberry, blackberry, apple cinnamon and "wildberry" mixes they used for the muffins. In bygone days, most of them made their muffins from scratch. "With real apples," said Hilda Wallman.

Her great-grandson, Justin Hoffman, will be one of the Jackson High School seniors feasting on the muffins this morning.

Eighty-seven-year-old Cody Musgrave used to make pastry at the restaurant in the old Idan-Ha Hotel in Cape Girardeau.

Opal Jaco stirred her mix with one hand because the other was incapacitated by a stroke.

While the others stirred, Alene Bollinger and Wallman filled the muffin cups.

Marilyn Freeman, activities director at the Jackson Manor, supervised the muffin production. She knows each woman very well, that Hilda quilts, Dorothy Stueve and Iva Thorn are dog lovers, Alene crochets, Opal loves Harlequin romances and Cody always wears her beads.

Jackson Middle School students regularly come to the Jackson Manor to visit with residents, as do 4-H and Scouting groups. Most of the Jackson High School seniors have been in the facility at one time or another, Freeman said, and the residents who love to bake just wanted to thank them for coming.

The intergenerational give and take between the Cape Girardeau Senior Center and the pre-school has been going on for a number of years. The preschoolers drop by at Christmas to sing carols and at Halloween to parade in their costumes.

The seniors in turn treat the children with candy and read books to them on occasion. "Our seniors love the little kids," says Senior Center administrator Susan McClanahan.

When the bakers arrived with the cupcakes, the approximately 100 children washed their hands, said a prayer and dug in.

One of the bakers put dinosaur candy atop her cupcakes, another topped hers with green sugar. "The chocolate ones with chocolate sprinkles went really quick," McClanahan said.

Preschool teacher Donna Rednick said the children get as much as the seniors from this interplay. "So many of them don't have grandparents that live in the vicinity. It's good for them to be around the older people," she said.