Out of the past: April 1

1991

A 45-cent hike in the minimum wage goes into effect, bringing the per-hour rate to $4.25; the increase comes exactly one year after an identical hike that raised it from $3.35 to $3.80 an hour.

The Cape Girardeau City Council approved a measure authorizing the Cape Girardeau Public Facilities Authority to issue $5 million in revenue bonds to fund the city's remaining $10 million share of the $35 million Cape LaCroix-Walker Creek flood-control project.

1966

Sen. A.M. Spradling Jr. was recognized by the Missouri Senate this week for his election as first vice president and chairman of the board of managers of the Council of State Governments in the United States.

A State College student recently became furious with his automobile; police received a call that Richard O. Gergs, 23, was jumping up and down on the top of his parked automobile at 1 in the morning; he also smashed the windows of the vehicle with bricks; later, he hooked up an electric guitar and played taps before the battered hulk.

1941

At the suggestion of local ministers affiliated with the Southeast Missouri Council of Churches, at least 24 organizations in Cape Girardeau have changed their meeting times from the week of April 6 to 12 to other dates in order not to interfere with the Visitation Evangelical Campaign scheduled for the pre-Easter season; the campaign will seek to sell religion through personal visits to those who aren't now participants in the work of the church.

Pinball machines, long absent from Cape Girardeau, are rolling back into some establishments here and in the county; the modern machines reward successful players with "free games," rather than payouts of money or merchandise as the old machines had done.

1916

Cape Girardeau will stage a fair this fall; that was decided last night, when 50 representative business and professional men met at the Cape Girardeau Commercial Club rooms and voted unanimously to have a fair; a 10-man committee was appointed to organize the event.

After much discussion, the Cape Special Road District commissioners agree to build the concrete wings necessary to make the bridge across Sloan's Creek serviceable again; for many months this bridge has been in a dangerous condition and couldn't be used.

-- Sharon K. Sanders