Out of the past: Dec. 22

1993

Lenore Bierbaum had planned to retire last summer; but as Christmas approaches, she still finds herself still employed as the dean of the College of Education at Southeast Missouri State University; her retirement has been put on hold while the university continues its more-than-a-year-long search for a new dean; the university is also looking for a new dean for the College of Health and Human Services.

Although the December sales tax check wasn't as much as county officials had projected, county auditor H. Weldon Macke is more than pleased with sales tax growth in 1993; the county's half-cent sales tax generated $3,450,060 in 1993, an increase of 7.02 percent over 1992.

1968

City engineers and the police department will make a study of West End Boulevard to determine to what extent the medians at locations along the street interfere with the movement of traffic; Roy Smith, 506 N. West End Blvd., recently presented a petition to the City Council asking the median in that block be altered to extend the left turn lane another 100 feet at the Broadway intersection.

Pastors at most Cape Girardeau churches center their sermons around the Christmas theme -- the birth of Christ nearly 20 centuries ago and what that event means to the world; special services are scheduled at most churches on Christmas Day.

1943

A bit of premature marching was done by some Cape Girardeau County Army selectees last night, when their civilian transportation bogged down on Highway 61, near Millersville, as they were coming home after being at Jefferson Barracks for examinations; the bus, leased for the trip, ran out of gasoline; the men, including numerous fathers, decided to hike on to Jackson, six miles away.

The duck and goose season, to close at sundown tomorrow, has been fairly good in the Cape Girardeau district; Conservation Agent Ed Hartle reports some geese have been killed recently near Charleston, Missouri; among others, some Jackson hunters bagged 12 in that area last week; he reports many ducks have been feeding the past few days in cornfields in the south end of Cape Girardeau County near Harris Field.

1918

The Rev. C.J. Moeller of Evanston, Illinois, gives an illustrated lecture in the interest of the Centenary movement in the evening at the Methodist Episcopal Church; the Christmas program by the Sunday school has been canceled at the church because of the influenza epidemic.

Trinity Lutheran Church in Cape Girardeau has been without a pastor for the past several months, since the death of the Rev. A. Wilder in the early summer; in the interim, the church has occasionally been cared for by a supply minister, and the pulpit today is filled by the Rev. A.M. Lohmann, who delivers a special Christmas sermon; the congregation's recently elected pastor, the Rev. F.M. Melzer, is to be installed Jan. 5.

-- Sharon K. Sanders