Out of the past: May 21

1998

A Cape Girardeau County deputy, who was in on Tuesday's capture of a St. Louis man wanted in a Southeast Missouri manhunt, has been presented the county's highest award for a law enforcement officer -- the Timothy J. Ruopp Award; officer Ron Eakins of the Cape Girardeau County sheriff's office was presented the award yesterday by Ruopp's 18-year-old son, Nathan, in recognition of Eakins' overall excellence as a law enforcement officer.

The annual Fourth of July festival in Cape Girardeau is back; a one-day event is planned complete with a fireworks display and parade; "We asked people to come forward and volunteer to help, and by golly they did," says Rodger Brown, the event's co-chairman; in March, Cape Girardeau VFW Post 3838 canceled the annual celebration but said it would reconsider if volunteers stepped forward to help.

1973

Southeast Missouri Building Trades Council might call a special meeting to decide whether or not to continue honoring pickets of Laborers Local 282, The Missourian learns; a source says representatives of Local 282, which went on strike Thursday morning, contacted few, if any, other trade unions to inform them pickets were going to be set up; as a result, other crafts honored the strike and are staying off job, not knowing why the strike was called.

While city folks spent a sunny weekend enjoying family outings or simple relaxing at home, most area farmers were out working from dawn to dusk, trying to make up for time lost in one of worst spring planting seasons in history; depending on where their fields are, farmers in Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois are from four to six weeks behind schedule.

1948

Mayor Walter H. Ford announces the Cape Girardeau Police Department will be outfitted Monday with a new automobile and a new motorcycle; the Chevrolet automobile is being equipped with lights, siren, seat covers, heater and other essentials before it can be put into operation; the motorcycle is a 1948 Harley-Davidson model, the largest and fastest made by the company, and was purchased from Cape Motorcycle Co. at a cost of $900.

Commencement exercises for John S. Cobb School are held in the evening in the school auditorium; Professor Moddie Taylor, a teacher of chemistry at Lincoln University in Jefferson City, gives the address.

1923

Blocked by a long freight train at Festus, Missouri, which prevented them from boarding a passenger train, the Bonne Terre, Missouri, delegation of Masonic candidates, who were to be given degree work at a meeting of the Cape Girardeau council Saturday night, failed to arrive here; they had motored to Festus in automobiles and were driving to the station, when the freight train blocked their way.

Dr. John J. Mayfield, 62, a practicing physician of Cape Girardeau County for nearly 40 years, dies at his Jackson home of Bright's Disease; born in 1861 at Mayfield, Missouri, a small place in Bollinger County named for his family, he moved to Cape Girardeau County a year after being licensed in the medical profession; he is survived by his wife, two sons, seven brothers and one sister.

-- Sharon K. Sanders