Out of the past: March 1

1997

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- Charleston High School faculty members will go before the Board of Education March 13 to tell members they want their principal back; more than 30 high-school faculty and staff want to know why the board didn't seek their opinions before deciding against rehiring principal Joe Forrest on Feb. 13; Superintendent Terry Rowe recommended the seven-member board rehire Forrest.

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- A 150-year tradition of separating whites and Blacks in Charleston's Oak Grove Cemetery has been stopped; since the 1840s, whites and Blacks have been buried in separate sections of the cemetery; but in February, the Mississippi County Commission, which has controlled the cemetery since 1877, closed an old section in which only Blacks were buried; now, both Blacks and whites will be buried in all open parts of the cemetery.

1972

A March 21 city primary election is assured with the filing of Gerald L. Stevens as a candidate for the three-year term open on the Cape Girardeau City Council; Stevens, secretary-treasurer of Cape Federal Savings and Loan, promises to promote orderly planning of future growth of the city; he enters the race with Roxanne Huckstep and Denis E. Rigdon.

The Cape Girardeau City Council has approved a request by the SEMO District Fair Association and the Future Farmers of America to enlarge the FFA barn in Arena Park; the association plans to construct an addition to the south side of the barn and redecorate it, making the barn more attractive.

1947

Hopelessly entangled in a mechanical corn picker, George E. Kirk, 56, a farmer on Devil's Island, used a pocket knife Thursday to cut off his own right hand; Kirk, who is recovering at a Cape Girardeau hospital, at the time was operating a tractor and corn picker for Elvis Caldwell on the Dr. C.E. Duncan farm on the island north of Cape Girardeau.

March roars in like a lion in the cloak of the winter's worst snow blizzard, spreading a slippery coating on streets and sidewalks and, for the second day in a row, blanketing the district in white; the forecast is calling for clearing tomorrow, but a cold wave is expected to send the mercury to 10 to 15 degrees.

1922

Lent, commemorating the Passion of Christ, begins today, Ash Wednesday; once only observed by Catholics, Lutherans and Episcopalians, the day is now recognized by nearly all Protestants as a most appropriate season for special prayer meetings and deep meditation.

Cape Girardeau is smack in the big of a big storm wave that covered most of the Midwest, resulting in the town finding itself under a white, slippery blanket and the temperature hovering around the 25-degree mark; snow began falling after 4 p.m. yesterday, and in the late evening it turned to sleet; sleet- and snow-covered sidewalks and streets are slippery, but there have been few accidents reported.

-- Sharon K. Sanders