Ken Steinhoff, Author at Cape Girardeau History and Photos

January 5, 2010January 5, 2010

SE Missouri from the Window of a Speeding Car

Someone’s farm from my speeding car

I don’t know why I even bothered looking at these frames that were tacked onto a roll of Brownies touring The Southeast Missourian. They looked grossly underexposed and were just some old buildings.

I let the scanner do its thing anyway and serendipity clicked in. (Serendipity is the effect by which one accidentally stumbles upon something fortunate, especially while looking for something entirely unrelated.)

It just dawned on me why I like these pictures. I had a Gordon Parks quote on my office wall for close to 20 years. It perfectly sums up my feelings about The Midwest and why I have to keep coming back to recharge my spiritual batteries.

In this huge silence

Homeward to the prarie I come,

to swim in the memories of childhood

and draw strength from the huge silence—

knowing that all I thought was dead here is very much alive,

and that there is a warmth here,

even when the wind blows hard and cold.

– Gordon Parks, Spring, 1984 –

Like so many of my pictures, I have no idea where these were taken. Let me know if you recognize them.

January 2, 2010

Spring Athletes-The Unsung Heroes

I’ve always felt sorry for the students who play spring sports: golf, track and field, baseball, tennis and the like.

They’re lucky if a handful of spectators show up to cheer them on. Most of their events take place after the yearbooks have gone to press, so they don’t get any recognition there until the next book. If they are seniors, then they probably don’t even make THAT book.

According to the note on the outside of the negative sleeve, I shot these on March 28, 1967. That was after I had graduated, so they must have been taken for The Missourian. Beyond the date, I have no other information about the pictures. It’s up to you folks to leave comments helping to identify these hard-working students.

Gallery of photos

Click on any image to make it larger, then click on the left or right side of the picture to move through the gallery.

December 29, 2009October 16, 2021

Some of My CHS Teachers Taught My Dad

Margi Whitright left a comment on my Helen Ketterer story: We loved these pictures of Miss Ketterer. Who went to Central and DIDN’T have to interact with her at some point? She was working at Central when my mother was a student there. Mother was born in 1914 and said Miss Ketterer was very young when she went to work there, obviously.

I pulled out my Dad’s 1931 Girardot.

Holy Cow! Helen Ketterer wasn’t the only faculty member that was there when my Dad was in high school. I recognized five names. [Update: Bill East pointed out one that I missed: Cornelia Gockel, who taught Business.]

Here are three pages from Dad’s 1931 Girardot

Note Irene Smith, above. We knew her as Irene Wright. Also Cornelia Gockel

Above page shows Miss Ketterer.

This page has Edna Haman, Mary Z. Reed and Clara Krueger (more about her later). I like the comment by math teacher J. Ross Adams: Hope we’ll all soon be riding airplanes, don’t you?

Miss Krueger’s retirement party in 1963

The Southeast Missourian’s Out of the Past column, produced by Sharon Sanders, contained this note:

75 years ago: May 24, 1927

Cape Girardeau Central High School Chapter of National Honor Society has been organized, with school receiving its charter last week; charter members of society are Mildred C. Johnson, Mary E. Drum, Ruth Berry, Lucy J. Vangilder, I. Duard Meyer, Dorothy H. Samuels, Vera E. Kasten, Aleene Kimmick, and Helen M. Ketterer; sponsor of local chapter is Clara Krueger.

December 28, 2009February 24, 2021

Helen Ketterer’s Other Side

I’m still trying to organize the stacks of negatives. For the most part, I’m setting all the sports pictures aside for now because there are so many of them. The next task will be to try to figure out which ones are from Central High School games and which aren’t. There should be some kind of law passed that uniforms have to have school names or emblems on them.

Who IS this woman?

I was just about to pitch this roll of wrestling pictures onto the ‘Later’ stack, when my eye was drawn to a fan in the bleachers in this sleeve marked January25, 1967.

Could that really be Helen Ketterer, who worked in the principal’s office?

I don’t think I ever saw Miss Ketterer smile or change expression in the office. She was always to-the-point and strictly business.

Of course, if you had to deal with as many high school students as she did, you’d probably be a little jaded, too.

It just goes to show that sometimes you don’t know folks as well as you thought you did. For example, I never knew Wife Lila was a bloodthirsty, raving maniac until I took her to her first live hockey match at Ohio University. I suddenly looked at her in a whole new light.

Helen Ketterer died in 1979

I did a search of The Southeast Missourian’s database, but it only goes back to 2002. Nothing relevant popped up. I sent a message to Missourian librarian Sharon Sanders asking if she had any info. She didn’t find anything going forward from 1991, but did see that Helen Ketterer was listed in the Social Security Death Index as having died in 1979.

This morning, Sharon sent me a copy of the March 25, 1979 obit:

Miss Helen Ketterer, 812 N. Missouri, died Thursday at her home. She was 68 years old.

Miss Ketterer was born on June 13, 1910, in Cape Girardeau and was a life-long resident. She was preceeded in death by her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Paul Ketterer.

She graduated from Central High School and was employed for approximately 40 years as a secretary at Cape Central High School, retiring about five years ago.

Miss Ketterer was a member of St. Vincent de Paul Parish and was an active member of both the St. Francis Medical Center Auxiliary and the Southeast Missouri Hospital Auxiliary.

Graveside services will be conducted at 10 Monday morning with the Rev. Bernard P. Degan officiating. Walther Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements. There will be no visitation.

A gallery from the wrestling match

Here’s a collection of photos from the match. As always, click on any image to make it larger, then click on the left or right side of the picture to step through them.

Let me know if you recognize the wrestlers, and I’ll post an update.