Out of the past 5/22/05

25 years ago: May 22, 1980

Despite a vote at last night's city council meeting to turn the city's public library building in Courthouse Park over to the county court, supporters of a community arts center and museum concept for the building say the battle for control of the building isn't over.

EAST CAPE GIRARDEAU, Ill. -- The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency intends to determine whether complaints are warranted as the result of an eight-car Missouri Pacific train derailment east of here yesterday that sent a cloud of nitric acid billowing into the air.

50 years ago: May 22, 1955

Exactly a century from the date the first small, one-room brick building for the congregation was dedicated, Grace Methodist Church begins a weeklong observance of its founding as Ebenezer Church, a member of the German Methodist Episcopal Church.

Professor L.H. Strunk of State College was chosen district governor of Optimist Clubs at the annual convention in Columbia, Mo., yesterday; Strunk has been a member of the Cape Girardeau club since 1939 and served as president in 1944; in 1953-1954 he was a lieutenant governor of the district.

75 years ago: May 22, 1930

Ely, Walker & Co. will move into its new factory building at Illmo next week to start the manufacture of garments with the plan of having 465 employees on the payroll within a year; mostly women and girls will be employed.

DEXTER, Mo. -- Floyd Frye, a collector for an insurance company and brother of Cape Girardeau County Prosecuting Attorney J. Grant Frye, is kidnapped at the outskirts of Dexter in the morning, carried a half-mile in an automobile by two holdup men, and released after being robbed of an undetermined amount of money.

100 years ago: May 22, 1905

The congregation of the Presbyterian Church met yesterday afternoon to take action on the resignation of the Rev. Robert S. Brown, which was presented a week ago; it was decided to accept the resignation; Brown will move his household goods this week, so as to be in his new home by the first of June; the local church is in no hurry to select a new pastor.

L.J. Albert has received a letter from his daughter, Clara Albert, saying she arrived safely in Rotterdam after a pleasant voyage; she is now in Brussels and will tour the principal cities of the old world.

-- Sharon K. Sanders