Out of the past 11/25/11

25 years ago: Nov. 25, 1986

Cape Girardeau firefighters are receiving some good experience this week, burning a large building in the Cape County Park that was in bad condition and ordered demolished by the county commission; for the past 12 years, the building had been used by the Cape County Senior Citizens Nutrition Center.

Barbara Brune, the chairwoman of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, says she will attend the Dec. 8 city council study session in an effort to obtain council direction on proposed park fees; she was invited to attend by Mayor Gene Rhodes in an effort to resolve differences between the council and the board.

50 years ago: Nov. 25, 1961

Crowds of shoppers yesterday, taking advantage of the brilliant, mild weather, thronged into the Main Street, Broadway, Good Hope Street and Town Plaza shopping districts to begin the Christmas shopping season.

Cape Girardeau police patrolman David Westbrook has compiled a file of photographs of various styles and makes of vehicles; he initiated the project to catalog vehicles back to World War II as a means of providing officers and the public a method of identifying suspect vehicles.

75 years ago: Nov. 25, 1936

Relief work in the county, so far as the county court is concerned, is virtually over until Jan. 1, because funds from the 1936 budget for that purpose have been exhausted; this particular fund cannot be added to until the new year begins.

A "Cape colony" exists in Los Angeles, according to Mrs. Charles W. Stehr, who has moved to California; she says other Girardeans also live there, including Mr. and Mrs. Max Koeck, and Charles Overstolz and his sister; the Stehrs recently sold their home place here.

100 years ago: Nov. 25, 1911

Professor E.A. Cockefair, for the past two years head of the agricultural department at the Normal School, has received notice of his selection to a post in the U.S. agricultural college at Puerto Rico.

The Martell water heater company has notified the Commercial Club that the company will accept the club's offer for locating its gas water-heater manufacturing plant here; Martell representatives will be in town next week to complete negotiations.

-- Sharon K. Sanders