Stories of Sprigg: Businesses on Sprigg ebb and flow

On Sprigg Street, there are places to get a haircut, buy a home, fill the cupboard, fix an automobile and get buried.

There are also places to fill a gas tank, fill a belly and buy a suit.

The businesses along Sprigg tend toward specialty retail or service shops. Many are small, where the owners work on-site, often with the next generation of their family at their side.

At Sisco's Barber and Hairstyling at 211 N. Sprigg St., owner Bill Sisco remembers growing up less than a block from Sprigg Street. His family lived in an apartment behind the barber shop his father, William Sisco, operated in the 700 block of Broadway. He joined his father in the business after graduating from barber college in 1960.

There has been a Sisco's Barber Shop in Cape Girardeau within one block of the Sprigg Street-Broadway intersection since 1938, he says proudly.

"For 66 years, this area is about all I've known," Sisco said.

Sisco tells stories of his brother, at age 10, standing in the intersection of Broadway and Sprigg Street directing traffic. The drivers paid attention, he said with a laugh, stopping and going on the signals from the youngster.

And like many longtime residents or business owners in the area, Sisco can easily say what has changed, what buildings are gone and where businesses that have long moved from Sprigg Street were located.

Sisco's isn't a typical barbershop. There are no walk-in customers solving the world's problems while they wait for a haircut. His waiting room is more like that of a doctor's office -- the building he occupies was originally designed for a physician -- and he only works by appointment.

"The only way I have ever worked is by appointment," he said. "I tell" customers "that every class at SEMO is by appointment, every TV show is by appointment, and my book is filled every day."

In his spare moments, Sisco can watch traffic go by the intersection of Broadway and Sprigg. For him, it is the crossroads of Cape Girardeau, a spot everyone, even those with only a passing knowledge of the town, recognizes. From that window, he can see the good and the bad of business on Sprigg. A new patio at Last Call bar and stable, well-established businesses can be ranked as the good side. Empty, seemingly neglected buildings are the bad. "It is just that over a period of time people have not kept up with their buildings."

Rejuvenation on the move

Sisco doesn't rely on walk-in trade to make a living and many of the small businesses along Sprigg don't either. Exit Realty, owned by Thomas M. Meyer and his son, Thomas L. Meyer, has been located at 230 N. Sprigg St. since 1953.

Thomas L. Meyer, known to most as Tom, said he couldn't survive if he relied on walk-ins. "We reach out to the community and don't expect them to come to us," he said.

Meyer does a lot of business in the central part of Cape Girardeau, and he sees the rejuvenation of the core city moving west toward Sprigg.

"There's a trend for change on Sprigg Street. Everything has a cycle," he said. "I've been seeing a phase in the last 10 to 15 years where I've seen Cape Girardeau's properties bought by people and then renovated. The cycle is becoming more intense in downtown, where buildings are being renovated in the arts, media and murals near the river.

"I see a positive direction. This doesn't happen overnight. I see a positive change."

Both Tom Meyer and his father have watched the ebb and flow of business along the street. Thomas M. Meyer, for example, recalls purchasing a car from the Ford Groves auto dealership, then at Sprigg and Themis streets and now on North Kingshighway, in 1949.

"I ordered the car, paid the down payment and got the car within six months," he said.

There are no new car dealers on Sprigg Street anymore. Save-A-Lot grocery at William and Sprigg streets is the only reminder of when several grocers operated on the street. Saint Francis Medical Center moved away. And in some stretches, especially from William Street to Highway 74, a visitor is as likely to encounter empty storefronts as full ones.

"From point A to point B, Sprigg Street has played a vital role in the community for many years," Tom Meyer said. "Though it may not be as prominent as it once was, Sprigg has definitely contributed to the economic climate and overall flavor of the city."

Working on South Sprigg

Some of Cape Girardeau's important industries -- rock quarries, Consolidated Grain and Barge and the Buzzi Unicem Cement plant -- formerly Lone Star Industries -- remain on Sprigg Street to the south. A rock quarry can't just move to a new location and the river dictates where the barge company operates. But the homes and small shops of a place once called Smelterville have all but disappeared.

There is one small, new business south of Southern Expressway that is thriving. Like many Sprigg Street businesses, Kitchen's Automotive wouldn't survive if not for the reputation of the owner. Joe Kitchen grew up in Smelterville, does the mechanical work at his shop at 1906 S. Sprigg St., and relies on his daughter, April Williams, to handle the phone calls, paperwork and other office chores.

Since South Sprigg Street was closed to through traffic in January as sinkholes opened up along Cape La Croix Creek, Kitchen hasn't seen a slackening of his business. His lot is filled with cars awaiting work, his shop is cluttered with tools and parts, and his hands are so covered with black stains from grease and oil that he's reluctant to shake hands.

The property was the family's Smelterville home with an attached shop, torn down after the 1993 floods. He raised the property for flood protection and moved into the location three years ago.

"I have people who come down here from St. Louis to get their cars repaired," he said proudly. "They can get stuff done down here without a hassle and at a better price. And we sit and talk."

Long-established business

The most intensive concentration of business along Sprigg Street is from Bellevue Street, one block north of Broadway, to Maple Street, just south of Highway 74. Ford and Sons Funeral Home is one of the longest-established businesses in that stretch, located at 118 S. Sprigg St.

"We still are in the original building that is more than 100 years old," Walter Ford said. "That one is completely enclosed by other buildings and additions throughout the years. We have purchased 12 total pieces of property that have been added near the current one. That last addition was 25 years ago when we added a chapel."

While the area has changed, Ford doesn't think it has changed for the worse. It is just different, he said.

"We would sit in our front lawn and talk to folks at they passed by or came to do business with us," he said. "You knew your neighbors, and the town was much smaller. It wasn't busy like it was today. It was a different time. But I'm not nostalgic about the area. This is just part of the times we live in. Businesses come and go, but the people are still the same."

Repeat customers

At nearby Arrangements by Joyce, 100 S. Sprigg, owner Joyce Cuntze offers a similar view. She could operate anywhere, she said. She's been in the same location since she purchased the business in 1980.

"I liked the location and didn't have a real interest in leaving, though I had toyed with the idea of relocating," she said. "Even though I haven't gotten real attached here, it's something I'll probably stay in for the future."

And like many of the service businesses along Sprigg, it is reputation and repeat business, not visibility and impulse walk-ins, that keep her in business. "We do so much business over the phone, so it wouldn't be advantageous for me to move to another area of town. Some customers have never even been in the store and I've been doing business with them since I opened. It's not so important in my business that we stay visible."

'Access to people'

And Sprigg is helped by the people who work along the avenue trading with the other businesses within the area. For Tom Meyer, the area has what he is looking for.

"The advantage of having my business right here is that I'm not too far from everything I need in the community," Meyer said. "This gives me an access to people, who are the heart of Sprigg Street and Cape Girardeau. My dentist, barber, attorney, favorite restaurants and postal service are all in close proximity to where I have chosen to remain as a businessman and live as a husband and father."

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126

bblackwell@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 137

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