Out of the past: April 2

1993

A fire that broke out in a warehouse at 2143 Independence St. yesterday afternoon extensively damaged the building and its contents; the warehouse, leased by several businesses, is in the Town Plaza near the Plaza Galleria; the building housed SEMO Heavy Industries, as well as equipment owned by Spartech Plastics, John Ford Construction and Mack McKinnis.

High school students from Sikeston and Leopold, Missouri, will advance to the International Science and Engineering Fair, having captured the top senior-division displays in the 37th annual Southeast Missouri Regional Science Fair; Drew Kiesling, a sophomore at Sikeston Senior High, and Melissa Engelen, a junior at Leopold High, earned the all-expense paid trip to the international competition.

1968

Teachers and frequently moms, their fledgling science pupils in hand, laden down with posters and a wide assortment of materials, put things in order at Houck Field House in the morning, and the 12th annual Southeast Missouri Regional Science Fair is underway.

Cape Girardeau voters select the incumbent, J. Ronald Fischer, and newcomer Ivan L. Irvin as their councilmen in the city election; they also turn down the city's bid for a park tax levy and emphatically reveal they don't favor any type of public housing.

1943

W.O. Ragsdale, 239 N. Middle St., has sold his 146-acre farm on Highway 61 north of Benton, Missouri, to E.N. Leach, a Sikeston, Missouri, business man; Ragsdale, who has owned the farm since 1928, also is selling off his livestock preparatory to giving possession about April 10.

An investigation is being made of a burglary at the Church of the Nazarene in Jackson on Tuesday night; a basement door was forced open; the Rev. G.C. Bohnannon, the pastor, says the items stolen include several hymnals, a guitar and case, and two Bibles.

1918

A 26-year-old native Cape Girardeau Countian, who had been living in Texas and Oklahoma the past 20 years, is shot and killed in an alley in the rear of the Osterloh Book Store on Main Street at 12:45 a.m., while trying to escape from police chief Arthur Whitner and police officers John B. Groce and J.W. Pearson; the young man had been attempting to escape officers, having been placed under arrest on state charges of forgery.

Billy Wilson, a Cape Girardeau boy who left last August with the 6th Regiment Band, arrives home in the morning from Fort Sill, Oklahoma, where he is now connected with 128th Artillery Band; he is spending a five-day furlough with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Maple Wilson.

-- Sharon K. Sanders