Cape Girardeau History and Photos

The students in the 1962 Girardot photo would feel right at home in today’s cafeteria.

The cafeteria has grown

The room has been expanded. The addition is where the floor tiles change from the checkerboard pattern to plain at the column line.

Cafeteria addition from the outside

The one-story addition on the west side of the school is the enlarged cafeteria.

Girl Power comes to CHS cafeteria lobby

A Girl Power poster and a purified water drink dispenser grace the cafeteria lobby.

Healthy food choices available

I’d love to know how they’ve kept the floors and tile walls this shiny in a school that’s half a century old. Looks like fruit is available in addition to normal cafeteria fare.

School promotes recycling

Don’t look too closely at the kids to see if you recognize anyone. One of the promises I had to make to be able to shoot in the school was that I couldn’t show any identifiable faces.

I ran into one of my former photographers last summer. He told me that he had just about stopped shooting candid shots of kids. “It’s not worth the hassle. Either the kids run away as soon as I approach them for their names or I keep waiting for a cop to haul me off as a kidnapper.”

I’m sure glad I worked in more innocent times.

The unsung cafeteria workers

Once the hubbub in the cafeteria dies down, these are the folks who have to get ready to do it all over again.

Yesterday’s post showed the Freshman class of ’66 in the Tiger Den. Today, we’ll look at some pictures of the Class of 1965 at its Sophomore party.

I see a bunch of familiar faces at this table. There’s Steve Crowe, Ron Dost, Phil Vinyard, Della Heise, Chuck Dockins, Lonnie Blackwood and Vicki Berry. [Note: Ms. Berry’s name is spelled Vickey, Vicki and Vicky in various Girardots. She signed one mine as “Vicky,” so that’s probably the right variation.]

I keep looking at the guy on the right side of the table with glasses and wondering if that’s me. The only thing that makes me think it’s not is (a) I’m usually the one SHOOTING the pictures and (b) I don’t play board games.  (I call them bored games.)

That might be Jim Stone

The guy dancing on the far left might be Jim Stone.

Is that Irvin Beard on the left?

I think that might be Irvin Beard, Class of 63, on the left. He was on the school photo staff. The girl in the middle, facing the camera, looks like Joan Amlingmeyer. Of course, since I’m not even sure of what I looked like, it’s hard to take any of my guesses seriously.

Dancing as a no-contact sport

Larry Points commented on my photos of the Capaha Park Pool Party, “My immediate observation would be that this was before corn fructose was put in everything…were we really all that thin back then? Dance moves also seem tentative, like the era of never making jitterbug contact again had just begun.”

He may have been onto something.