Out of the past: March 26

1998

Southeast Missouri State University's Board of Regents Wednesday approved design plans for a $4.5 million Sikeston (Missouri) Area Higher Education Center despite uncertainty over local funding for the project; board president Don Dickerson and regent Loretta Walker questioned if regents should approve building plans when Sikeston has yet to raise the local match needed to proceed with the project; in the end, the regents voted to approve the project provided that Sikeston voters approve a sales tax issue that is on the April 7 ballot and a formal contract is signed between Sikeston and the university regarding the center.

Southeast Missouri State University has agreed to buy a 17-acre tract from the Cape Girardeau School District at a cost of $250,000; the university plans to build two soccer fields and tennis courts on the undeveloped land, situated on the northwest corner of North Sprigg and Bertling.

1973

A Cape Girardeau physician and an associate have leased the Chaffee (Missouri) General Hospital for a 12-year period with option to renew; Dr. William O.L. Seabaugh and William E. VanPelt Jr., manager of the Seabaugh Clinic in Cape Girardeau, assumed the lease yesterday under the name Seabaugh Management Corp.; the lease had previously been held by Dr. T.P. Fenton of Charleston, Missouri; Seabaugh, who plans to continue his practice here, has been visiting the Seabaugh Clinic in Chaffee twice weekly for the past several years; he will continue to spend time at the Chaffee clinic and will also practice at the hospital.

With a massive effort to raise the upper fuse plug levee of the Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway completed, the Army Corps of Engineers is patrolling Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois levees to watch for weakening sections.

1948

Wind, rain and hail combine in an electrical display that disturbs the sleep of most Girardeans in the early morning hours, but no great damage is done by the storm; heavy rains, however, are feeding the rising Mississippi River; at 8 a.m. at Cape Girardeau, it measured 35.75 feet; it's expected to crest Monday at 37.6 feet here.

Carl E. Jenkins, 30, of Cape Girardeau died last night at Saint Francis Hospital due to burns sustained the day before while working with a line crew of the Missouri Utilities Co., a mile south of Oran, Missouri; Jenkins was holding a wire when it came in contact with a charged electric wire carrying 33,000 volts.

1923

"I'm the happiest girl in the world," declares pretty, smiling Judith Wilkerson of Charleston, Missouri, newly elected "Queen of the Sagamore"; Wilkerson won the tile of "prettiest girl" at Cape Girardeau Teachers College Saturday, when she was elected queen over Irene Miller and Grace Beeler.

Union of the Northern and Southern Methodist churches into a single organization, presided over by a Superior Conference, leaving both churches free to act in local and district matters, is the plan being fostered by Bishop Edward D. Mouzon of Nashville, Tennessee, chairman of the unification committee of the Southern Methodist Church; Mouzon, visiting Cape Girardeau, says the plans developed in the last eight years will unify the churches which were separated in 1844.

-- Sharon K. Sanders