STUDENTS GIVE MUSEUM NEW LOOK FOR EXHIBIT

Missouri's Betsy Ross, a man whose defiant "Show me" became the state motto, and the state's stubborn official animal will be honored when the River Heritage Museum reopens Thursday with a new exhibit and look.

A Southeast historic preservation class taught by Bob White organized the "Show Me Missouri!" exhibit and redesigned the museum's exhibit space in the process. White is on the museum's board of directors.

"I feel like this is a new beginning for the museum," says Delilah Tayloe, one of the 13 Southeast students who worked on the exhibit.

"Show Me Missouri!" will open with a public reception from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday. There will be music and a visit by live mules Friday, Missouri Mule Day. Museum hours will be 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday. School classes may attend by making reservations with Mandy Wagoner at 339-3305.

The museum also will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday.

The exhibit originated last year with a marketing class taught by Dr. Charles Wiles. The class dreamed up an exhibit they called "Missouri Firsts." White's historic preservation class turned the idea into reality and changed the name to "Show Me Missouri."

The class began by analyzing the museum's primary exhibit space. "We realized we would more or less have to start from scratch," student Carolyn Leffler said. "We moved everything out."

That included an old exhibit about the late Jess Stacy, a famed jazz musician.

False walls were installed on the west and south sides to give the museum more exhibit space and keep sunlight from coming through windows and damaging artifacts. The class painted other walls about a month ago.

The museum's old exhibit on the Missouri flag is being augmented with much more material, some of it loaned by the family of flag designer Marie Oliver. She lived in both Cape Girardeau and Jackson.

Among the artifacts is the sewing kit Oliver used to make the flag and a portrait of Marie at 17.

The Missouri mule display is a traveling exhibit organized by the state Department of Natural Resources. It chronicles the importance of Missouri mules, from their use in the Civil War to the settlement of the West and winning of World War I.

The term "Missouri mule" entered the lexicon when animals owned by a Platte County mule breeder swept the competition at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis.

Mule breeders still can be found locally.

The traveling exhibit has been augmented with a Civil War saddle on loan from Don James of Marble Hill.

The mule became the official state animal in 1995 after a campaign spearheaded by Cape Girardean Charles Woodford. Woodford will speak at Thursday's reception, as will White.

Willard Vandiver is the focus of the third part of the exhibit. A former president of the Normal School -- now Southeast Missouri State University -- who served in the U.S. House of Representatives, it was Vandiver who gave the state its motto.

Lalena Lewark, a student who researched the Vandiver exhibit, says he was giving a speech in Philadelphia and wearing everyday clothes because his suit had been stolen.

When a previous speaker jested about Vandiver's attire and praised the Philadelphia's hospitality, Vandiver said, "I'm from Missouri, land of corn, cotton and cockleburs and Democrats, you'll have to show me."

"Philadelphia hadn't show him that it was a nice place," Lewark said.

Lewark is from Bellflower, Calif. She came to Southeast because it is one of only two schools in the nation offering an undergraduate degree in historic preservation.

Vandiver is credited with speaking out against atrocities American troops had committed in the Philippines after the Spanish-American War.

"You could say he was one of the early speakers for human rights," Lewark said.

Vandiver's large house still stands at the northeast corner of Sprigg and North streets.

Vandiver, Oliver and mules have been important to the state and to Cape Girardeau.

"Cape Girardeau has a lot to be proud of," Tayloe says.