Out of the past 1/14/08

25 years ago: Jan. 14, 1983

The silver screen is coming to West Park Mall; Wehrenberg Theater plans to open a four-screen, 1,000-seat movie theater within the mall; the West Park 4 Cine will be the chain's 32nd location.

False fire alarms resulting from a new smoke detector system in the Towers dormitories at Southeast Missouri State University this week have kept city firefighters shuffling between the university and the two responding firehouses; detectors are being adjusted for sensitivity in an effort to overcome the problem of some of them being set off by cigarette smoke.

50 years ago: Jan. 14, 1958

It is announced by the Corps of Engineers office at St. Louis that there will be a reduction in expenditures in the district as a result of a ceiling imposed on civil works projects under the terms of the federal budget; what effect this reduction will have on the Mississippi River flood project at Cape Girardeau isn't indicated.

Roscoe Collier, chief engineer for the State Park system, is due in Cape Girardeau today to supervise the start of development on Trail of Tears State Park; six miles of road will be constructed immediately through the park.

75 years ago: Jan. 14, 1933

The town of Illmo will apply to the Reconstruction Finance Corporation for a loan of approximately $42,000 with which it will build a modern water plant; a site for the new plant is already owned by the city.

Alleging that his reputation was injured by an editorial in The Missourian two years ago, Samuel W. Fordyce, a well-to-do lawyer and head of a big firm in St. Louis, has filed suit against the newspaper, asking $100,000 damages; the editorial commented on a speech Fordyce made in St. Louis on the subject of prohibition.

100 years ago: Jan. 14, 1908

Dennis Scivally is appointed highway commissioner of Cape Girardeau County by the County Court.

An accident takes the life of a cadet at the Jackson Military Academy; Everton Parks, 14, a first-year man, receives a bullet in the head from a revolver he and a friend are trying to empty; Parks is survived by his mother, Mrs. E.K. Parks of Caruthersville, Mo., and a brother.

-- Sharon K. Sanders