Out of the past: Feb. 8

1999

Cape Girardeau proposes to spend $75.5 million on capital improvements over the next five years, with $40.6 million being spent in the first year; city staff unveils a draft of the latest version of the capital improvement fund during a City Council study session; the program is updated annually and lists projects planned over a five-year period; a public hearing on the program likely will be scheduled for March 1.

Southeast Missouri is quickly becoming one of the strongholds for the drug court concept in the state; six counties in Southeast Missouri either currently have a drug court or are actively planning on establishing one in the county within the next two years; those counties are Cape Girardeau, Scott, Mississippi, Stoddard, Dunklin and Butler.

1974

While independent trucker organizations across the nation are voting on the strike settlement offer announced in Washington, drivers who shut down their rigs at Rhodes City Truck Plaza south of Cape Girardeau wonder what they should be voting on; leaders of the striking truckers at Rhodes, whose numbers have dwindled from 70 to about 45, think negotiators in Washington are stalling in order to get the truckers back on the road with promises; in other strike news, a Colonial Baking Co. truck from Paducah, Kentucky, is fired on early in the morning on Route K near the entrance to the Holiday Inn.

A "bandit snow" -- the kind that sneaks in at night and is gone by morning -- visited Cape Girardeau overnight leaving over a half inch of snow, which freezes by daybreak, causing major traffic tie-ups; Cape Girardeau police report 17 traffic accidents between 6 and 9 a.m., mostly fender benders on Broadway and connecting intersections.

1949

A recommendation to the U.S. Engineers that the widening of the Mississippi River at Gray's Point, seven miles south of Cape Girardeau, be initiated and completed at the earliest possible time is adopted by the water resources and flood control committee of the Mississippi Valley Association at a pre-convention meeting in St. Louis; Gray's Point has been termed a bottleneck to river navigation for many years, and it also adds to flood problems of this area.

Superintendent of schools Louis J. Schultz has been given a three-year contract by the Cape Girardeau Board of Education; the action was taken last night; the subject of the superintendent's contract came up as an outgrowth of a discussion of the reorganization plan for schools in the county; his former contract, also drawn up for a three-year period, had one year to run.

1924

ORAN, Mo. -- Following repeated failure to reorganize, the closed Bank of Oran is in the hands of a special deputy of the State Banking Department, which will liquidate the affairs of the institution; P.N. Keller, former Chaffee banker and now secretary of the Chaffee Building and Loan Association, has been named special deputy to liquidate the bank's affairs.

An immediate appeal to the Missouri Highway Commission will be made to take steps at once to place the road between Dutchtown and Delta in shape for traffic, according to residents of Delta and local business men; the road, especially between Delta and Blomeyer, is in such poor condition that it can be traveled only with a wagon; automobile traffic has been barred from the road for weeks because of the mud and water.

-- Sharon K. Sanders