Out of the past 8/11/07

25 years ago: Aug. 11, 1982

About 100 women and two men turned out at the Arena Building last night to learn how to defend themselves against attackers; instructors were police training officer Lt. Leonard "Dale" Ratliff and patrolman Robert E. McCoy Jr., who holds a black belt in karate.

The $100,000 loan commitment yesterday by the Cape Girardeau and Scott county courts to Southeast Missouri Regional Port Authority would be used with $840,000 in state bond money for site development in anticipation of the port's first industry, a privately financed $30 million plant that would provide more than 500 jobs.

50 years ago: Aug. 11, 1957

One of the leaders of Methodism, Dr. Roy L. Smith, delivers the sermon at the annual service at Old McKendree Chapel in the afternoon; coupled with the address by one of the nation's well-known preachers is the singing of old religious hymns by a 50-voice choir, which has been assembled from Methodist churches in the Cape Girardeau district.

A remodeled and enlarged Sunny Hill Milk Bar, 45 South Boulevard, will reopen tomorrow with all new fixtures and kitchen equipment; a 20-foot extension was added to the building across the north end, making room for a glass entrance and vestibule and a waiting lounge.

75 years ago: Aug. 11, 1932

Plans for the construction of a building for St. Vincent's Council of Knights of Columbus in Cape Girardeau in the near future are revealed; work on the big building will start early in the autumn, as soon as a site is secured.

A second freight train derails early in the morning on the Frisco Railroad, two miles north of Bainbridge, Mo., where three youths lost their lives early yesterday when a locomotive and 10 cars piled up after striking a downed tree; no damage of note occurs in today's wreck.

100 years ago: Aug. 11, 1907

The Baptist Church in Cape Girardeau begins a new era of life and usefulness when it welcomes its new pastor, the Rev. J.O. Willett, to the pulpit.

William Juden, a salesman for a St. Louis shoe house, is in Cape Girardeau to see his wife, who has been here some time visiting his sister and brother; the Judens live in Oklahoma City, Okla.

-- Sharon K. Sanders