Out of the past: Dec. 13

1992

Vocalist Julia Cowsert of Cape Girardeau has begun a music ministry to spread the Christmas message; she is performing a program titled "For His Glory" throughout the area.

A praise and remembrance service is held in the evening at Old Hanover Lutheran Church; guest preacher is the Rev. Adam Mueller, former pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church at Friedheim, who now is retired; the liturgy and sermon are in the German language, with carols sung in English and German.

1967

In a topping-out ceremony conducted in the afternoon 147 feet above sidewalk level, a large lighted pine tree is placed above the 13-story, tower-type section of the new Hirsch Broadcasting Co., building in the 300 block of Broadway; the ceremony is in observance of completion of the concrete exterior of the building.

The Missouri Army National Guard announces a final reorganization plan for Southeast Missouri, which disbands the last two infantry battalions, transfers the state engineer headquarters from Cape Girardeau and reduces troop strength by 225 men; the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 140th Infantry, headquartered in Cape Girardeau and Poplar Bluff, now are set to be replaced by the 1140th Engineer Battalion.

1942

Cape Girardeau County and Southeast Missouri, in conformity with orders from Seventh Service Command headquarters in Omaha, Nebraska, will be plunged into 20 minutes of darkness at 10 p.m. tomorrow in the first blackout ever held in this area; the signal for the practice blackout in Cape Girardeau will be given by a series of intermittent blasts from whistles at various points of the city and a steady ringing of church bells.

Addie Allers of Jackson has had word from her daughter-in-law in Spokane, Washington, telling her an intercepted Japanese short-wave broadcast mentioned her son, Lt. Howard Allers, is a prisoner and is interned in a concentration camp.

1917

Five young men were enlisted yesterday at the special recruiting office in Cape Girardeau for the U.S. Navy and are sent to St. Louis today to take examinations; on the list are four Cape Girardeau boys, C.V. Brumback, Ray Kain, Claude L. Bryeans and Herman J. Magee; the other man enlisted was R.P. Hale of Blodgett, Missouri.

Roy Jaynes, master of the ferry boat Gladys, receives a message advising him to get to Mounds, Illinois, on the Ohio River as quickly as possible as his boat tied up there for the winter is in danger from ice jams; he leaves on the noon Frisco for Chaffee, Missouri, on his way to Mounds; ice on both the Ohio and Mississippi rivers is unusually heavy for so early in the season.

-- Sharon K. Sanders