Out of the past 7/25/05

25 years ago: July 25, 1980

Police come up empty-handed after searching a small pond in Shawnee Park, in the south part of the city, for the body of Dr. Margaret Smith, the 73-year-old former university instructor who has been missing for more than two weeks.

A Jackson man was killed yesterday at the Cape Girardeau Country Club golf course, when the tractor he was driving tipped over backward, pinning him beneath it; the driver of the tractor, Richard C. Martin, 70, of Jackson Route 4, was pronounced dead at the scene.

50 years ago: July 25, 1955

The first group of men from the 140th Infantry of the Missouri National Guard depart for Camp McCoy, Wis., in the morning; under the command of 1st Lt. Robert A Henderson, the Area Supply Detachment leaves by motor bus for the camp; the main contingent of men will go to camp July 30.

Members of the Goodwin family, a number of them living at Jackson, announce plans to sell the 1,521 acres of the L.A. Goodwin estate; virtually all of the land is level and is rated as fertile land, mostly well developed; there are seven farms, located chiefly at Delta, and the land formerly, prior to drainage development, was at the north end of the one-time Southeast Missouri swamp area.

75 years ago: July 25, 1930

While in Cape Girardeau, president J.W. Jeffries of Will Mayfield College at Marble Hill, Mo., says prospects for the opening of school on Sept. 1 are bright, with indications the enrollment will go over the 200 mark.

With a tour of the Mississippi River Valley, during which conditions in the flood areas have been studied first hand, virtually completed, the congressional flood-control committee is expected in Cape Girardeau tomorrow and will complete its two-week investigation with a dinner at the Hotel Marquette; a resume of the results of the tour, together with suggestions of what the committee will recommend to Congress, is expected to be given.

100 years ago: July 25, 1905

D.A. Glenn and family, Mabel Glenn and Delia Kimmel leave in the morning on their summer vacation; they will visit in St. Louis and Chicago, and then go to Petosky, Mich., on the lake for a rest; Glenn plans to go to Grand Rapids, Mich., and buy the show cases and other fixtures to be put in by the Glenn Mercantile Co.

Strange as it seems, the proposition to build a new courthouse at Jackson is meeting some opposition.

-- Sharon K. Sanders