Out of the past: June 9

1991

A ground-breaking ceremony is held in the morning for the new Family Life Center at Centenary United Methodist Church, 300 N. Ellis St.; delivering the message at the event is Missouri Bishop W.T. Handy Jr.

Organizers of this year's Riverfest say the two-day celebration drew large but well-controlled crowds to Cape Girardeau's riverfront Friday and Saturday; new restrictions on alcohol consumption combined with pleasant weather contribute to the festival's success; the 13th annual Riverfest drew about 60,000 downtown.

1966

Because it feels it can do for $7,000 what the federal government estimates would cost up to $30,000, members of the Cape Girardeau Civic Center board of directors have abandoned plans to engage in an Operation Head Start project; the board had intended to use federal funds to establish a day-care center for small children and an after-school study and cultural enrichment program for older children of the Smelterville area.

The widening of Highway 72 in and west of Jackson for a 3-mile stretch has been completed, and final work on the shoulders and drains is in progress; the main improvement on the stretch is the third lane added to the roadway at its junction with Main Street.

1941

Made necessary by national-defense contracts, including one for a number of Army trousers, the Ely-Walker Co. is making preparations for the opening of a plant in the abandoned Fornfelt Hosiery Co. building at Fornfelt on July 15.

The board of Kage School, west of Cape Girardeau, has employed Kathryn Cobble of Cape Girardeau as instructor for a second teaching unit for the coming year; earlier the board re-employed Mrs. Walter Klaproth as instructor of the upper grades.

1916

The meetings in the Eli Forsythe tabernacle are beginning to attract wider attention from day to day; last night, a goodly sprinkling of Jackson people were noticed in the audience, and some few from other nearby towns; the choir was in fine voice, as was its leader, professor Charles H. Forsythe.

CHAFFEE, Mo. -- Voters in Chaffee will go to the polls June 29 to decide whether the city should issue bonds for $21,000 for the construction of a waterworks system; besides the convenience of a water system, those in favor of the proposal say it will result in a great saving in fire insurance rates; there is hardly ever a fire in Chaffee without two or more houses burning.

-- Sharon K. Sanders