Out of the past 1/25/12

25 years ago: Jan. 25, 1987

Mary Wheeler Messer has retired as director of student activities at Baptist Student Center on the Southeast Missouri State University campus; she was honored with a surprise reception Saturday.

Freezing rain and sleet coated highways in Southeast Missouri with a layer of treacherous ice last night, causing an accident on Highway 177 that took the life of a rural Cape Girardeau man.

50 years ago: Jan. 25, 1962

Tom F. Baker, a representative from Stoddard County, in a letter to area newspapers, urges decentralization of the state colleges and the University of Missouri and a single board to administer all the state's institutions of higher learning; with regard to Cape Girardeau's State College, he said regents "by September 1962" should establish a branch at the Malden (Mo.) Air Base.

Lloyd Ford has been appointed the new superintendent of the R-6 School District at Oak Ridge; he succeeds R.D. Guthrie, who resigned Monday.

75 years ago: Jan. 25, 1937

Two large gaps are blasted in the old Mississippi River side levee south of Birds Point, Mo., by U.S. Army engineers, who use 2,000 pounds of dynamite; the action comes after 18 breaks are found in the front line levee guarding the giant Mississippi River spillway in Mississippi and New Madrid counties.

CAIRO, Ill. -- Mayor August Bode orders all women and children to leave Cairo because of "the uncertainty as to the crest of the river here;" Cairo is surrounded by a 60-foot sea wall, but the rising river is at 58.08 feet.

100 years ago: Jan. 25, 1912

The creosoted wood blocks for paving Water Street are being unloaded here, and the work of paving the street will be rushed as soon as the weather is favorable; the other work of rebuilding the levee and the tracks is being carried along as fast as the weather permits.

The big clock on Trinity Lutheran Church is going again, after a rest of a few days, to the annoyance of many pedestrians, who quicken or slow their paces by a glance at its dial.

-- Sharon K. Sanders