Cape Girardeau History and Photos

June 4, 2013

Chuck Murdoch’s Kids

I’ve run a picture of Missourian Sports Editor Chuck Murdoch a couple of times: here and here. The first time I did, some of his relatives ran across it and left the following comments

Judy Weiss: “Chuck was husband’s uncle. I had not seen that picture before. Thanks!”
Norman Weiss: “Unfortunately cancer took my Uncle Chuck’s life but many great memories remain. Trivia about my Uncle Chuck before he became a sports writer, he was a St. Louis Cop.”
L. Louton: “Oh wow, just stumbled across this article – Chuck Murdoch was my grandpa. It puts a smile on my face to see such a great pic of him!”
Cara Murdoch: Would you be able to send those photos of Dad(Chuck)? I would love to get copies! And, of course, my little sister, Terri and little brother, Roy. Any of Mike(big brother)?

Chuck’s kids

I KNEW I had some pictures I had taken of Chuck’s kids for a New Year’s Eve illustration.

Let’s set the record straight: I was lousy at shooting illustrations and setting up photos in general. These hokey photos prove it. (Click on the photos to make them larger.)

The microfilm copy of the December 31, 1966, newspaper was missing part of the caption, but the part you could read said “Terri, 5, and Roy, 4, children of Mr. and Mrs. Charles W. Murdoch, 106 Edgewood, thought it would be great fun to practice for the arrival of a new year. At 8 o’clock Terri and Roy were going strong.”

Midnight was a different story

“But as the clock ticked off the minutes and hours, eyes got heavier and by midnight the sandman had called. Well, maybe next year will be different and sleep won’t be so overwhelming.”

A favorite sports editor

Chuck was one of my favorite sports editors. To be frank, most sports editors fit into one of two categories: former high school athletes wanting to relive their glory days or ones who were dumber than a packet of possums.

The latter would drive us crazy. One of them would send you out on the most hackneyed situation with an assignment sheet that would invariably read, “Avoid cliche shot.”

Another one couldn’t read a sport schedule. The photographer would show up at where an event was supposed to be held and find out that it wasn’t at THAT field or on that date. We couldn’t dope out how a couple of thousand spectators could manage to figure out where the game was being played, but the sports editor couldn’t.

Chuck was easy to work with, tried to get me as many $5 assignments as he could sneak by jBlue, and didn’t take himself or his job too seriously.

Gentlemanly politically incorrect

Much of what Chuck’s persona wouldn’t pass today’s politically correctness, but he was careful about his language around “the ladies” in the office. He COULD fog up the place with his cigar, though.

His watch says 11:20. If it’s AM, that means he has wrapped up his section for today’s deadline and he’s wandering around kibitzing; if it’s PM, then we’ve both made it back to the office after covering a game. I doubt that’s the case. I would have had to go home to process the film before going back to the office to drop off the prints so Chuck would have them when he came in around 4:30 in the morning. With those kind of hours, I doubt he was hanging around in the evening. He’d been banging out sports stories for so long he wouldn’t have been staying up late agonizing over every word.

A technical side note: the pictures of Chuck were taken with the half-frame camera I carried for “goofing around.” It shot two photos in a normal 35mm frame, so I could get 72 shots out of a 36-exposure roll. The trade-off was that the quality was only half as good. On top of that, this roll had some uneven development streaks. I guess it would be the equivalent of taking photos with a cellphone camera instead of a real camera these days: you sacrifice some quality for convenience.

June 3, 2013May 4, 2021

Pizza King Corner Crash

For a second I thought this was the same crash at Pacific and Broadway I had already covered, but it was definitely a different one. One of the things I found interesting was that it captured the Pizza King, which was once the Last Chance – First Chance Saloon.

Vandeven Mercantile is on the left.

View east on Broadway

Vandeven’s is on the right. You can see The Esquire, Wayne’s Grill, Radonics, Bodines and other lighted signs. This picture must have been taken later than the one below because the sign above proclaims “We’ve Gone Gulf.”

The old trolley tracks are visible in the middle of the street.

Station had been Cities Service

The station on the northeast corner of the intersection had been a Cities Service. Looks like the Bourbon billboard had been allowed to go blank in the later photo.

Howard’s on right

The old Howard’s Athletic Goods was on the right. Howard’s moved into the Vandeven building in 2009, then SEMO tore down the old (ugly) landmark building for a parking lot.

View to the north

Howard’s is on the left and the Gulf station is on the right. It’s warm enough that people are wearing light jackets, but I see the car on the left is still running snow tires. The banner mentions American Education Week, which is traditionally held in November, so it might be a warm, but rainy winter night. Those random white spots are caused by raindrops reflecting the camera’s flash.

Looks pretty minor (if it’s not YOUR car)

I’m going to guess the guys in the background are involved in the crash in some way. They have The Look on their faces.

I’m guessing the wreck was minor enough that nobody was hurt. The best indication of that is that the windshields don’t have any head dents.

June 1, 2013

High School Students Study Science

The July 3, 1965, Missourian caption reads, “High school pupils participating in the science training program at State College do a little outside experimentation too! [Please tell me I wasn’t the one who wrote a caption with an exclamation point.] From left are: Miss Susan Eubank, Edgewood, Ill.; Miss Melinda Carter, Lockwood; Stephen Hancock, Kennett, and Ron Fluegge, Jackson. The youths are getting experience in academic and social college life. The program is supported by an $18,000 grant from the National Science Foundation.”

Here’s my whole bylined Youth Page story about the science program.

Negative tomfoolery

This nameless couple didn’t make the paper, probably because they didn’t engage in any shenanigans.

That could very well have been because Girl Two’s mother said, “Keep your baton with you at all times. If anybody tries to get fresh with you, twirl ’em where it hurts.”

May 31, 2013June 6, 2013

Cubs’ Pitchers Had Problem

The day after I graduated Central High School in 1965, I showed up bright and early to start my Missourian summer internship. To my dismay, my first assignment was to fill in for the sports editor, who was going on vacation.

I confessed to Chuck Murdoch that I knew virtually nothing about sports and was in deep trouble. He took a couple of sucks on his ever-present pipe and a look of relief passed over his face as he realized his job was safe: this was ONE high school kid who wouldn’t show him up. He gave me the crash course in sports journalism (something that I always thought was somewhat of a contradiction in terms).

He explained that the first thing I had to do when I showed up three hours before the rest of the staff was to go to a dropbox on the Broadway door to retrieve an armload of youth league score books the coaches had dropped overnight. I was to take those score books and interpret scratches and scrawls that showed every batter and every play and write a play-by-play of the high spots of the games. I prayed for a tight paper so I could get by with just a game summary.

I got the job done, but I felt like a monk translating ancient scrolls from one language into another. So far as I know, nobody ever complained about my accounts.

Last night I found this comment written by a coach who either had a great sense of humor or a flair for understatement: “Cub’s pitchers couldn’t find the strike zone and walked 22 batters.”

First AP story

I thought it amusing enough I phoned it in to the Associated Press, which put in on the wire. I’m pretty sure that was the first time anything of mine moved on a news wire. It was a real thrill when I heard the clatter of the teletype and discovered that it was my brief that was going out to the world (well, maybe the nation or the region or the state. I don’t remember the codes well enough to know how far it was broadcast. It didn’t win the Pulitzer, I know that.).

I didn’t do too badly covering government and cops, but the society and agriculture beats were a bit of a stretch. I loved it.