Out of the past: Dec. 27

1998

The City Council plans to spend much of 1999 gathering public support for continuation of Cape Girardeau's extensive street improvement effort; voters may be asked in November to extend the half-cent sales tax that funds the city's Transportation Trust Fund; voters approved the tax -- earmarked for new road construction, major repairs and street maintenance -- in 1995; it expires Dec. 31, 2000; although two years remain before the tax sunsets, city manager Michael Miller says the city wants to develop a list of priority projects and estimated costs before putting the issue before voters.

PERRYVILLE, Mo. -- When Pope John Paul II visits St. Louis next month, it will be a banner day for St. Vincent High School juniors Angela Carron and Jessica Lakenan; the two Catholic high school students made two banners for the pope's visit, Jan. 26-27; one banner will be displayed at the youth rally at the Kiel Center on Jan. 26; the other will hang in the Trans World Dome where the pope will celebrate Mass the following day.

1973

A car-train collision early yesterday afternoon in Scott City at an unlighted railroad crossing claimed the live of Mitchell G. Kiplinger, 50, of Scott City; Kiplinger was the driver of a northbound car; he attempted to cross the railroad tracks at Oak Street, pulling in front of a Cotton Belt freight train.

Persons in the Cape Girardeau area will be able to get a ringside seat for a closer view of Kohoutek as the comet moves past Earth on a swing which will take it back out of the solar system and provide prime viewing of the bright nighttime spectacle; observation posts will be set up at Southeast Missouri State University, probably in front of Academic Hall, during January so the public, along with members of the science faculty who will be recording data and taking pictures, will be able to get a closer view through telescopes of the comet.

1948

BIG BEAR, Calif. -- The table was set for Santa Claus, but death came instead for young Dr. Jerome G. Schnedorf, two of his children -- aged 3 and 8 -- and his mother; their bodies were found yesterday among Christmas decorations and unopened presents, apparently the victims of carbon monoxide poisoning from a gas heater; the bodies were discovered by the physician's wife, Mary M. Lamb, daughter of Professor and Mrs. Charles B. Lamb of Cape Girardeau, when she awoke from a coma of more than 30 hours; she and the eldest child, aged 10, were in a rear bedroom and thus narrowly escaped the fate of the others.

An offer for free hospital service for mother and new arrival at Southeast Hospital went begging Christmas Day, when the maternity ward passed the full holiday without a birth; Southeast had offered to foot the charges for everything except the doctor's bill to the first baby born at the hospital Dec. 25.

1923

Joe Herbst, 65, of 233 N. Lorimier St., is injured when he is run down by a truck belonging to the Stehr Mercantile Co. on Good Hope Street, near Sprigg Street, at 10 a.m.; Herbst sustains bruises on his knees, slight lacerations on his body and chest injuries, which aren't expected to be serious; Herbst says he didn't see the truck until after he was struck.

Mrs. Lee L. Bowman of Cape Girardeau has been advised of the sudden death of her brother-in-law, J. Walton Limbaugh, in Pueblo, Colorado; no particulars concerning the death were received, the message merely stating he died suddenly; Limbaugh was born and reared in Jackson, the son of attorney T.J. Limbaugh; survivors include his second wife, the former Bertha May "Babe" Stoecker, a sister of Mrs. Bowman; a 9-year-old daughter and three sisters.

-- Sharon K. Sanders