Out of the past 8/18/05

25 years ago: Aug. 18, 1980

Cape Girardeau County Circuit Court Charles P. Hutson and his staff begin moving into new office space in the former Cape Girardeau Public Library, even as Jackson and out-county residents opposed to the move announce their intentions to file a petition with the Missouri Supreme Court Wednesday to block the move.

As it has so many times the summer, the immediate Cape Girardeau area once again narrowly missed a thunderstorm that dumped up to two inches of rain just north of here yesterday.

50 years ago: Aug. 18, 1955

Bids for construction of the first unit of the Mississippi River flood-control works at Cape Girardeau will be taken Nov. 15, according to present plans of the Corps of Engineers, which will have supervision of the project; first work will entail building a sewer system in the area to be protected.

Thieves, with a tendency toward vandalism, broke into the Do-Nut Drive-in, 1617 Independence, last night, took $25 from the cash register and made a shambles of the interior of the building; once they gained entrance, the hooligans streaked doughnut icing about the interior, opened a cabinet drawer and removed invoices, which they scattered, along with pages ripped from a telephone directory.

75 years ago: Aug. 18, 1930

Probably the most severe drought in the history of Cape Girardeau and Southeast Missouri was at least temporarily broken yesterday by rains which fell, with few exceptions, generally throughout the district; Cape Girardeau, with 0.078 of an inch of precipitation, had the heaviest rain since March 24, a period of approximately five months.

Papers are being prepared by the state highway department for instituting condemnation proceedings to secure right of way through four parcels of land for the farm-to-market road between Dutchtown and Whitewater; these proceedings will be executed within the next several days, unless landowners come to a settlement.

100 years ago: Aug. 18, 1905

It is now an established fact that the sandbar which has menaced shipping at this point for many years is disappearing; two long fences which the government built from the opposite shore last fall have done the work intended, slowly wearing away the sandbar.

Notwithstanding that the county court has failed to act upon the suggestion of the state health board, it is probable that a strict quarantine will be put on in this county.

-- Sharon K. Sanders