Out of the past 1/18/10

25 years ago: Jan. 18, 1985

Cape Girardeau police are asking a lot of questions about how two city jail inmates managed to escape undetected through a cell-block skylight and lower themselves two stories from the roof of police headquarters using a rope fashioned from their cells; the pair broke out some time between Wednesday night and yesterday afternoon; both remain at large.

One of the leading figures in the Watergate intrigue, G. Gordon Liddy, is scheduled to speak on the campus of Southeast Missouri State University on Jan. 29.

50 years ago: Jan. 18, 1960

President Mark F. Scully announces the extension of the graduate program at State College as an adjunct of the University of Missouri, with all courses to be offered on the campus here; the Board of Regents recently voted to extend an invitation to the university to establish a graduate center here that will offer complete curricula for a master's degree.

City Commissioner Max Stovall announces a $3,159 plan to mark unmarked Cape Girardeau streets, old and new; the program will erect signs on older streets where markers have disappeared or been destroyed, as well as in new subdivisions.

75 years ago: Jan. 18, 1935

Three hundred Girardeans have signed petitions at the public library asking the city council to build a new annex to the present library building; the proposed annex would cost about $15,000 and would be built on the south side of the present structure.

Fred C. Campbell, troubleshooter for the Southeast Missouri Telephone Co., fractures his left wrist when his safety belt breaks and he falls 12 or 15 feet from a telephone pole on Locust Street, between Ranney Avenue and Sprigg Street.

100 years ago: Jan. 18, 1910

A number of Cape Girardeau Republicans have started a movement for the organization of a club to be known as the "Republican Club of Southeast Missouri"; an organizational meeting will be held the evening of Jan. 25.

J.M. Allison, for years connected with the Glenn store on Main Street, has formed a corporation for the purchase of the Ladies' Toggery on Broadway, taking charge of the business today.

-- Sharon K. Sanders