Photos around Cape Archives

January 1, 2015January 1, 2015

Resolutions and Sunrises

This illustration I did for The Southeast Missourian in 1966 shows how Wife Lila and I usually welcome in the New Year.

Follow this link to see more photos of Terri and Roy Murdoch, children of Mr. and Mrs. Charles Murdoch, and to read about their dad.

I’m not sure I ever heard Chuck Murdoch called “Charles.” He was just “Chuck,” one of my favorite sports editors. He didn’t take himself or his job too seriously, but he loved covering kid sports and did everything he could to get as many names in the paper as he could.

When did you quit smoking?

I recall the year that Dad quit smoking cold turkey on New Year’s Eve. We all noticed that he had gotten crankier than usual, but he didn’t tell us for a couple of weeks that he had tossed all his cigarettes in the fireplace at the stroke of midnight. He didn’t want to say anything until he was sure he could do it.

I’ve been binge-watching the TV series Mad Men, which is about an advertising agency in New York in the 1960s. I thought I was going to choke to death during the first few episodes because there wasn’t a scene that didn’t have people filling the air with smoke. When I thought back on it, that’s just the way it was in those days, particularly in the newsroom.

(The photo department became non-smoking as soon as I became director of photography. I claimed it was for technical and safety reasons, but the truth was that I hated smelling the smoke.)

Plenty of readers shared their smoking experiences.

Sunrise on the beach

In a moment of insanity on the first day of 2011, I consented to go to the Lake Worth beach to watch the sun come up. Now, don’t get me wrong. I HAVE seen the sun come up before, but it’s almost always been because I stayed up all night the night before.

Anyway, it was a beautiful dawn and I don’t regret going.

Once.

Click on the link so you can see how nice it was (and keep from having to go yourself).

Start the year off right

While you are making your New Year’s resolutions, make a note that you will click on the big red Click Here button at the top of the page (or right here) whenever you order something from Amazon.

I get a tiny percentage of the price, and it doesn’t cost you a penny.

How about that? Here’s a resolution that doesn’t cause you to sweat, doesn’t cost you any money and doesn’t change your eating or drinking habits. You can’t beat that with a stick.

December 30, 2014

Rerun: Stairs to Nowhere

I had always wondered about the concrete stairs to nowhere and some foundations at the corner of Bertling and Big Bend Road.

After posting some pictures of the corner on March 27, 2010, the answers started rolling in.

Since this is a rerun, I’m not going to give it all away.

You’re going to have to follow this link to get the whole story because all the good stuff is in the comments. If you follow links in the original story, you’ll read about the 1957 fire that claimed the life of a toddler.

Less tragic (except to the chickens, I suppose) was the 1935 grisly discovery of 17 chicken heads on the side of the road, a tip-off to a raid on the 29 hens and a rooster at that address. (A least two miscreants were involved: one with average size shoe tracks and one with extremely large ones. Be on the lookout. They may still be out there.)

December 29, 2014

Rerun: Barber Shops

One of my first scans was barber Ed Unger giving a young boy a haircut. Ed started cutting hair in 1935 and kept going until he retired in 1983.

The thing I liked about him was that he let me read my comic book in his chair.

This post is where I figured out that a photo doesn’t have to be technically great to be good memory touchstone.

Click on the links to read the whole story and see more pictures.

Stylerite Barber Shop

In 2011, I got permission to go into the old Stylerite Barber Shop at 312 South Sprigg, Ed’s old shop, and the one where I dropped many a hair on the floor. (I probably should have held onto a few of those.)

I took a self-portrait in the mirror where I had stared back at a much younger, comic-book-holding Ken half a century earlier. I don’t know for a fact that it was the same mirror, but I like to think it was hanging there waiting for my return.

Both posts attracted some good comments.

Sisco’s and Skinner’s

I made some extra money when I came home on Christmas break in 1967 by roaming around taking pictures of buildings for the upcoming Missourian Achievement Edition.

Among the targets was the Sisco’s Professional Barber Salon next to Ricardo’s Italian Swiss Chalet Ristorante in the 700 block of Broadway.

I also snapped Skinner’s Barber shop next to Eggiman’s Authorized Dealer of Maytag and Admiral Appliances on South Plaza Way. The shop must have had a short life, because it didn’t even show up in the 1969 City Directory.

December 28, 2014April 14, 2021

Rerun: Shoe Factory to Casino

I asked the folks in the Growing Up in Cape Girardeau Facebook fanpage what they’d like me to repost. There were lots of requests for stuff either before or after my time – it’s hard to believe that my photo window in Cape was only from about 1963 through 1967. Several people asked for shoe factory photos. Unfortunately, I never was inside the building. The best I can do is a collection of ground and aerial photos documenting the transition of the biggest business in Cape to a casino.

This aerial photo was taken in the early 1970s. It ran in one of the most extensive posts I did dealing with the history of the shoe factory. If you follow only one link, it should be this one. By the way, you can click on the photos to make them larger, but following the links will take you to more pictures and the backstories.

Reporters love stats

Reporters love stories with lots of statistics, and a 1925 Missourian story was full of them: the factory produced 3,164,080 pairs of shoes, enough to provide every resident of Cape with 175 pairs.

There was a human side, too. The company bragged that “no death or accident of serious consequence has been recorded…”

I’m not sure if the shoe company would qualify this as an injury of “serious consequence, but I’m sure Mrs. McCrite would:

June 24, 1926 – The condition of Mrs. Octavia McCrite, who is in the Cape Girardeau hospital following the loss of her scalp in an accident at the factory of the International Shoe Co. Saturday, was today reported to be unchanged.

If you read the comments, Mrs. McCrite was the grandmother of one of my readers. It sounds like it must have been an horrific injury with lifelong consequences.

A view from the tracks

Here’s a view of the shoe factory from the Red Star side of the floodwall. The river was coming up, but never got high enough to have to close the floodgate. [If you are short on time, this is a link you can skip. The picture is pretty much the story.]

Shoe factory neighborhood

Here’s a wreck on Main Street at the shoe factory. The piece has pictures of buildings in the neighborhood, including one that became various things: Fairway Market No. 2, Margarite Mama’s and the Mule Lip.

Aerial photos of Red Star and Casino area

I shot a series of aerial photos of the old shoe factory site and surrounding area just as clearing was beginning. This one showed Red Star looking to the south.

Morrison Ice and Fuel

A nondescript brick building south of the old shoe factory had been Morrison Ice and Fuel. It had the corner on the ice market in the early 1900s. It eventually became the Pure Ice Company.

When refrigerators first started coming out, Pure Ice sold Coolerator Iceboxes, but marketed them as a replacement for the old-fashioned wooden iceboxes (with a $5 trade-in), not as a refrigerator like we think of it today. Home ice delivery went on in Cape until the 1960s. That’s why a lot of people still call the fridge an “icebox.”

2011 and 2012 casino panoramas

I took panoramic photos of the casino to compare the changes between 2011, when it was mostly just a slab, and a year later.

Casino at night in 2012

After the casino opened, I took some night time exposures of it.

Downtown parking vs casino parking

Aerials showing the number of cars downtown and at the casino.

Bingo is still thriving

In 2010, Bingo folks were concerned that the casino would cut into their business. It doesn’t look like their parking lot is empty.

Hirsch’s Northtown

My post on the building across from the shoe factory that eventually became The Mule Lip was short, but it drew lots of comments from people who went there in its various permutations.