Out of the past: July 15

1995

Sizzling hot temperatures are made even worse by the water problems Cape Girardeau is having; yesterday morning, the last of the city's three pumps, all damaged during the Mississippi River flooding, broke and a handful of water customers lost pressure; the breakdown led the city to issue a boil-water order; it also asked residents to conserve the water supply; emergency repairs to the pumps were finished last night, and today, workers are battling the heat to install a second pump.

Cape Girardeau municipal Judge Edward Calvin ruled against a strip-tease bar Friday, setting the stage for a jury trial over the legality of the city's adult-business law; Calvin ruled the manager of Regina's House of Dolls violated the law by failing to keep dancers at least 10 feet from customers.

1970

A plan to widen four highway bridges at Jackson is a step toward improving safety of students, but shouldn't be the final action, the Jackson School Board declared last night; for a long time, the board has prohibited school buses from crossing the bridges except during periods of light traffic due to the narrowness of the spans.

Unplanned Cape Girardeau residential and commercial expansion into low-lying flood plains of the Mississippi River and Cape La Croix Creek create a danger of increasing "human suffering and economic losses" from future floods, the City Council learns; the warning comes in a special flood plain information study report on the river and its tributary, submitted by the St. Louis District of the Corps of Engineers; Mayor Howard C. Tooke says the city will use the report as a basis for controlling "encroachment and development" of the flood plain areas.

1945

Lt. Col. Arnold Roth, a veteran of 35 months of service in the European Theater of Operations, arrived in Cape Girardeau on Friday afternoon on a weeklong leave; this is his first leave home since he entered military service 37 months ago; he has been serving with the 15th Air Force.

B.I. Howard and Bertyl Swan have announced plans to open an athletic sporting goods store at 900 Broadway on Aug. 10 in the building formerly occupied by the USO Center.

1920

CARUTHERSVILLE, Mo. -- Caruthersville business men are expecting great things of their new cotton compress, which will be ready for business this fall; it will be the first compress in Missouri, and those who are directly interested in it say it will be a great money-maker for Southeast Missouri cotton growers; with a compress in Caruthersville, cotton growers will be able to get market price for their crop; should the market be off, they can place their cotton in storage and on the receipt can borrow money on it until the market gets better.

The Cape Girardeau Portland Cement Co. plant is running at full force, which means paving and construction work in the area has resumed; construction work throughout Southeast Missouri had been at a standstill for weeks, due to a lack of cement, caused by a shutdown of the local plant.

-- Sharon K. Sanders