Out of the past: July 17

1992

Seventeen years after the Trail of Tears State Park Marina on the Mississippi River was completed, the Missouri Department of Natural Resources is giving up its attempt to maintain the $1.5 million facility as a slackwater harbor. The DNR will continue to operate a boat ramp there for access to the river.

In an effort to get its pollution-reducing, coal-burning boiler running more efficiently, Southeast Missouri State University plans to enlist the aid of the boiler's designer, Alex Wormser; Wormser will be hired by the university as a consultant at a cost of about $6,000 or $7,000.

1967

CHAFFEE, Mo. -- Everyone was given his say at a hearing Saturday on the slow pace of Highway 77 bridge construction here, but a solution to the situation remains unknown. In the course of the meeting, it was evident most are concerned that the highway be completed by this fall; residents worry they may have to go through another winter without a through route into Chaffee or to their jobs.

Bulldozers begin clearing the right of way for Route K in Cape Girardeau as work begins on the $724,533 project to extend William Street to Interstate 55. A.G. Construction Co. of Perryville, Missouri, has contracted for project that also includes a 135-foot bridge over Cape LaCroix Creek.

1942

ORAN, Mo. -- Oran dedicated its new, $15,000 city hall yesterday, a crowd of several hundred people braving 95-degree temperatures to attend a program that began in the morning with a band concert and march and went through the afternoon with the actual dedication; the program ended in the evening with a public dance. The structure, built of native limestone, contains city council and chamber of commerce quarters, offices for city officials and a jail in the basement.

Operations at the New Rigdon Laundering and Cleaning Service, 22 N. Sprigg St., are suspended when 32 women, members of the Laundry Workers Union, CIO, walk out. J.A. Rigdon, head of the firm, says the women are asking for higher wages.

1917

The 280 employees of the Messler box factory at Fornfelt walked out on a strike for higher wages Saturday, and the plant is closed today. It's one of the largest and best equipped in the country. The employees are demanding a 30-percent increase in wages.

In a letter to his mother, Herbert Niemyer, not quite 20 years old, tells of his life as a soldier; Niemyer, formerly a clerk in the drug stores of H.C. Wasem and the Jones Drug Co. here, is training in Detroit in the hospital corps of the U.S. Cavalry.

-- Sharon K. Sanders