Out of the past: Jan. 23

1999

A bridge was washed out and at least two roads remain impassible in Scott County in the wake of Thursday night's thunderstorms that spawned as many as eight tornadoes, caused power outages and deluged some Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois communities with as much as 6 inches of rain; Scott County took the brunt of the power from the line of storms that moved into the region from Northern Arkansas; heavy rains washed out a bridge on County Road 217 off Route A halfway between New Hamburg and Chaffee; also closed due to flooding is a 3.5-mile section of Route W two miles west of Oran and a two-mile section of Route Z between Crowder and Tanner; a vacant mobile home between Benton and Kelly High School was lifted from its foundation.

Capitalizing on the pope's scheduled visit to St. Louis next week, 13 Republican state senators have called on Gov. Mel Carnahan to help lawmakers ban partial-birth abortions; the group includes Sen. Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau, who repeatedly has sought to ban such abortions.

1974

Pupils in the Jackson School District who ride school buses heavier than 6 tons over Cape Girardeau County's 6-ton load limit bridges soon will be unboarding their buses and walking across; the Jackson school board last night instructed the administration to examine the weights of loaded buses traveling the bridges and order children riding these buses that exceed 6 tons to unboard, walk across the span and board again on the other side; the safety decision was prompted by the County Court's disclosure Jan. 14 that it had learned from former county highway engineer George Penzel that the bridges were built to sustain maximum weights of 5.6 to 6 tons; the school district's lightest empty bus weighs nearly 6 tons.

CAIRO, Ill. -- The current wet conditions in Southern Illinois, aided by melting snow to the north, have raised the waters of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, and officials are watching the rise with cautious eyes.

1949

One man is killed and five persons injured, three seriously, in a series of weekend motor vehicle accidents on district highways; James H. Loos, 26, of Jackson is killed instantly in a two-car crash this morning two miles northwest of the city on Highway 61; Iris M. Ledure, 25, of Oran, and Elmer Smith, 24, of Cape Girardeau are seriously injured.

Vanduser, Kelso, New Hamburg, Morley, Cape Girardeau, Sikeston, Chaffee and Oran definitely decide to enter teams in the proposed Southeast Missouri softball league during a meeting at Vanduser; New Hamburg, Bell City and Jackson are undecided; New Hamburg's diamond doesn't have lights, while Bell City will in all probability have to remove its lights from the present field to another; Jackson is unable to make a definite commitment.

1924

One hundred and ninety-two creditors of the A.J. Matthews and Co., Inc., an organization having control of 32,000 acres of farmland in Southeast Missouri, valued at $3,200,000, will meet at Sikeston tomorrow to approve a plan to be submitted by the Creditors' Committee, which wants the combine broken and its affairs liquidated; a final disposition of the affairs of the corporation, in which holders of certificates of indebtedness will be given the privilege of taking over land as part payment for debts against the combine, will be proposed at the meeting.

Leo Berkbigler, 40, of Oran, an employee of the Scott County Milling Co., died at his home last evening from a skull fracture sustained at the mill Monday, when he fell from a boiler on which he was working to a concrete floor, 20 feet below; Berkbigler came here five years ago from Bollinger County; he is survived by his widow and two children.

-- Sharon K. Sanders