Cape Girardeau History and Photos

January 10, 2014

Getting Ready for the Dance

Here are a few photos I found later that go along with a post I did on Decorating the Gym back in 2012. I held back on them because they were pretty scratched up and nor particularly sharp. I needed some quick content today, though, because I’m planning to do a computer upgrade this evening and I needed to get everything shut down so I could do a backup.

(Thanks, by the way, for all you folks who click on the Click Here button to do your Amazon shopping. That helped made the upgrade possible. I was running low on disk space for all these photos.)

Sackman and Towse

Miss Kathryn Sackman, left, American History teacher, and Miss Lucy Ellen Towse, physical education instructor, discuss what acts of tomfoolery the students are contemplating.

When I look at those ceramic tile walls, I can’t help but remember the way sounds reverberated off them. It was a curious mix of bouncing balls, yells, the squeak of rubber tennis shoe soles on slick floors, punctuated by bleats from the coaches’ whistles. I file it away with the unique sound of silverware hitting thick china plates and the buzz of milk shake mixers at the Woolworths’ lunch counter.

Other decorating photos

Click on any photo to make it larger, then use your left and right arrow keys to move through the gallery.

January 9, 2014

Mississippi River Ice

The Mississippi River never iced over enough for me to shoot people and cars crossing over to Illinois, but I have taken pictures of floating ice before. These photos were taken in the mid-1960s.

Walking across the river

Fred Lynch posted a Frony photo from 1936 showing people and a bike on the river, but he said it didn’t run, possibly because the paper didn’t want to encourage such behavior.

The ice floes were a little thicker when I shot the river in 2000.

January 8, 2014

1940-ish Snow Storm

I was looking through scans from Mother’s college scrapbook when I saw what must have been the snowstorm of 1940 or thereabouts. This shows the terraces south and east of Academic Hall. Click on the photos to make them larger. I looked but didn’t see anybody sledding down the hill.

Albert or Leming Hall?

This might be Leming Hall, but I’m going to let someone else make the call. A Missourian story said Albert Hall and Leming Hall were almost identical in appearance and layout. Another picture in the scrapbook labeled Albert Hall, taken at a different time, showed steps leading up to screened-in porch.

A Frony photo showing a city crew putting cinders on Normal Avenue in front of Leming Hall shows a screened-in porch and no columns.

A photo from 1960 showing students moving out of Albert Hall before it was razed shows the columns and no porch. Maybe the screening was taken down in the winter, which would explain the difference.

Unknown location

I don’t know where this photo was taken, but considering how much snow there is, I have to think it was taken around the SEMO campus. I can’t imagine Mother would have been able to make it back home to Advance given the condition of roads back then.

January 7, 2014

Founder of Cape’s McDonald’s Killed in Crash

I shot this photo as a candidate for The Missourian’s annual Achievement Edition because it looked like Ricardo’s Italian Swiss Chalet Ristorante on Broadway had been spiffed up. My newspaper buddies are going to say I buried the lead, so stick in there until the very end for a surprising twist.

Not as spiffy in 2009

I was scrolling through some of the other pictures I’ve taken walking up and down Broadway more recently and spotted this 2009 picture that makes the building look a little rough. I can’t tell what has gone into what used to be Sisco’s Professional Barber Salon on the left. There are some beer signs in the window, so it may have been joined with the former Ricardo’s.

Tattoos replace optometrists

Optometrists Joe L. Mosley and James A. Drace have been replaced by a tattoo parlor.

Owner of landmark business dies in crash

When I did a search for “Ricardo’s” I couldn’t believe the story that showed up in the March 7, 2003, Missourian: “Crash kills founder of Cape McDonald’s.”

As 13 of the fast-food restaurants around Southeast Missouri continue to fly their flags at half-staff, authorities are pointing to bad weather as a contributing factor in the Wednesday night airplane crash that took the life of Jerry Davis, the man who brought McDonald’s to Cape Girardeau 35 years ago.

The McDonald’s connection would have been enough to make him an important figure in Cape’s dining scene, but a detail at the bottom of Scott Moyer’s story was astounding: In the past, Davis has also owned Royal N’Orleans and three eating establishments that have since closed: Ricardo’s, Shakey’s Pizza and Pfisters Drive-In.

Except for Wimpy’s, Mr. Davis had a corner on Cape Girardeau’s version of American Graffiti.