Southeast Missourian Archives

January 3, 2014October 10, 2023

There ARE Dumb Questions

How many times have you been told “There are no dumb questions?” Take it from me, there ARE dumb questions. I asked one. More about that later.

The Missourian’s January 16, 1967, front page lead story was “Cake Fires Girls’ Dorm,” with three of my photos. Clothing and bedding were destroyed and smoke and fire damage were extensive when fire enveloped a room in Dearmont Quadrangle, women’s residence hall at State College, Saturday night (January 14).

Wally Sinwell looks at birthday cake

Wally Sinwell of St. Louis, right, who used hall extinguishers to contain the blaze, looks at birthday cake whose candles ignited paper, while firemen view the room.

B & C wings were evacuated

Girls living in B and C wings, in pajamas and pincurlers, were evacuated, but later returned to their rooms.

Contents damaged

A fire which apparently started from a birthday cake Saturday night damaged a room on the fourth floor of Dearmont Quadrangle. Damage was extensive to the room and its contents. Firemen said mattresses on the bunk bed were destroyed, clothes in the two closets were badly burned and smoked, drapes on the windows were ruined and the ceiling will have to be redone.

Carroll Walker, dean of students, said the room was occupied by two freshmen, Miss Mary Lou Halliday, Shipman, Ill., and Miss Patricia J. Ham, St. Charles.

Preparing surprise birthday party

Walker said the girls told him they were preparing to celebrate the birthday of Miss Halliday. Some of the girls had taken her down the hall in order to surprise her.

Miss Martha Susan Owen and Miss Iris Anne Hargrove, both of Paducah, Ky., and Miss Patricia Ann Singrun, St. Louis, were in the room decorating for the party. Mr. Walker said they told him they were putting toilet paper on the ceiling and some was on the floor when a piece of the paper fell from the ceiling across the lighted candles on the birthday cake. The paper burst into flames and the girls said they tried to put the blaze out, but couldn’t.

Here’s the dumb question

That was the official version.

Somewhere in a box in my shed is a tape recording I did of my interview with the girls where they confirmed that they had, indeed, dangled toilet paper all over the room. With luck, it’ll never be found and played.

“When we walked into the room with the birthday cake, a streamer dropped onto one of the candles and the whole room burst into flames,” one of them told me.

My question, which I tried as hard as I could to haul back into my mouth, was, “Was it supposed to?”

I think a withering glance was the only answer I got.

Student fought fire

Walter J. Sinnwell of St. Louis, a student who was in the parlor of the quadrangle when the fire broke out, collected building’s fire extinguishers and attempted to put out the blaze.

Miss Halliday said that at one point the fire was thought to have been put out by the extinguishers, but when they went out looking for more extinguishers, some one heard and explosion – “probably a can of hair spray or spray deodorant” – and the room was engulfed in more flames than before.

Cake remained intact

Capt. Paul Kesterson said a pumper, a ladder truck and nine men went to the scene. The Seagraves pumper and 140 feet of one-inch hose were in use for two minutes.

He said one of the girls was concerned because a radio her mother had given her Christmas was damaged. Through it all, he said, the birthday cake remained intact. It had some dirt and water on it, but was still in one piece on the hallway floor.

Photo gallery of women’s dorm

I have to admit that charging into a women’s dorm was a lot less exciting than I thought it would be. I never knew there were so many different forms of pincurlers. Click on any photo to make it larger, then click on the sides of the photos or use your arrow keys to step though the images.

December 28, 2013June 23, 2023

The Achievement Edition

The Missourian’s big annual extravaganza was the Achievement Edition, published after the first of the year and looking back at the previous year’s accomplishments. We started working on the copy and photos well before Christmas.

Back in the old days before computers, we didn’t have filenames to keep track of stories, headlines and layouts. We used “slugs,” a line of lead type with a descriptive title. If the reporter was sending the story in several “takes” or pieces, then he or she would create a slug that might say, “murder1, murder2.” Since the composing room would occasionally miss taking the slug out, it was a good idea not to use titles that could be embarrassing (like labeling the religion news “god junk”).

Because the Achievement Edition copy was done so far in advance, it was given an additional slug “Atomic” so it wouldn’t get crammed into the daily paper. Or, at least that’s the way I remember it.

One Christmas break when I came home from Ohio University – it was probably 1967 – Editor jBlue asked if I would have time to roam all over the region shooting buildings like The Wishy-Washy Laundr-O-Mat. The 1968 City Directory says it was at 1526 Independence and that Homer R. Dickmann was the manager. At five bucks a shot, plus mileage, I jumped at the opportunity.

Start at the outside and work in

In those days, The Missourian was a regional paper. My negative sleeves said I went north as far as St. Genevieve, as far south as East Prairie and as far west as Lutesville. jBlue, always cost-conscious, instructed me to start at the far ends of the region and work inward toward Cape “so I don’t have to pay you to drive the same roads more than once.”

I was told to shoot any commercial buildings that looked new or remodeled and a representative sampling of any new homes that looked “expensive,” defined as costing more than $25,000. By the time I got done with the project, I could have qualified as a tax assessor.

I must have thought Ricardo’s Italian Swiss Chalet Ristorante looked recently spiffed up. The City Directory says it was also known as Rich House Inc. and was located at 731 Broadway. It was flanked on the left by Sisco’s Professional Barber Salon (Wm. D. Sisco), and optometrists Joe L. Mosley and James A. Drace on the right.

Sterling replaced the St. Charles Hotel

The Sterling store replaced the historic St. Charles Hotel at the corner of Main and Themis. I photographed it being torn down.

Personal Finance Loans

John H. Jarrett was listed as manager of Personal Finance Loans, 31 Main Street. The other buildings include Zickfield’s Jewelers, Tony’s Jewelry and Gift Shop and the Sweet Shoppe.

Eggiman’s

Skinner’s Barber Shop must have had a short life. It doesn’t show up in the 1969 City Directory, and there is a sign in the window that says “For Lease, Inquire at Eggimann’s.”

Eggiman’s Authorized Dealer of Maytag and Admiral Appliances (Richard L. Eggiman, mgr) was at 225 South Plaza Way. That’s my old 1959 Buick LaSabre station wagon parked in front of Eggiman’s.

Swann & Son Garage

From the off-kilter angle of this photo, I wonder if I might have just changed rolls of film and this was a shot where I was advancing the new roll of film to get past the leader. Swann & Son Garage (C. Elwood Swann) was located at 430 William Street.

Missourian Litho and Printing

Missourian Litho and Printing Co. (John Beaudean) was at 500 William.

Cape Chiropractic Clinic

Cape Chiropractic Clinic, 726 Independence, was occupied by Drs. Wm. D. and R.M. Edwards.

Dr. M. Allen Brock

The building on the right has a sign large enough to read that says “Dr. M. Allen Brock – Chiropractor.” The City Directory has Dr. Brock’s address as 148 S. Ellis, but this doesn’t look like Ellis to me. I can’t read the sign on the building on the left. If I had to guess, I’d say this is Independence.

Ford’s Meat Company

Ford’s was located almost directly across from the Steinhoff, Kirkwood and Joiner Construction Co. on Hwy 61 near Sprigg Street. Managers were Bessie N and Lloyd N. Ford.

Power substation

I think this might be the power substation located on the east side of old Hwy 61 that leads to the Diversion Channel boat ramps. It has been expanded in recent years and is protected from flooding by a huge dike around it.

Photo gallery of Cape and St. Genvieve buildings

Some of the negatives were in sleeves that said “Cape;” a few, though, said “Cape – St. Gen.” I’m going to assume that the ones with snow in them were Cape. I didn’t bother to try to identify the residential buildings because The Missourian’s microfiche in Google was missing the dates when the Achievement Edition ran. You’ll have to give me your best guess if you see something that looks familiar. Click on any photo to make it larger, then click on the sides to move through the gallery.

If there is interest, I’ll scan buildings from East Cape, Scott City, Illmo, Charleston, Bertrand, Lutesville, Marble Hill, Chaffee, East Prairie, St. Mary, Perryville, Old Appleton, Oak Ridge, Fruitland, Brewer, Thebes, Olive Branch, Tamms, Delta, Bloomfield, Aquilla, Diehlstadt, Oran, Morley, Benton, Kelso, Delta, Advance, Patton and Brownwood. Oh, and I just found another sleeve of Cape buildings. As you can see, there isn’t much of Southeast Missouri I haven’t prowled. Unfortunately, I won’t have any IDs on the buildings. I’ll be lucky to get the town right.

December 22, 2013November 27, 2020

Picking the Perfect Tree

I’m pretty sure Missourian editor jBlue gave me a Christmas bonus in 1966 without calling it one: he ran five of my photos on the front page. That’s $25 in my pocket when my salary was in the neighborhood of $50 a week. Here are most of the shots that ran, plus a couple of extras for good measure. (Click on the photos to make them larger.)

The caption on the Dec. 12, 1966, paper read, “Louis Owens, 805 South Sprigg, asks Mrs. Owens if the specimen he holds is satisfactory.”

“I found it!”

Joy Metje, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Earlie Metje, McClure, Ill., shouts she’s found the one she wants.

It’s a cold day

To Jimmy Trickey, son of Mr. and Mrs. James Trickey, it’s a cold day and he wishes mom and dad would hurry and make up their minds.

Mother and daughter choice

Mrs. Lowery B. Miller, white coat, and her daughter, Diane, discuss a tree.

Not the Stones

The paper ran a photo of Mr. and Mrs. John Stone and son, Timmy, 1726 Stoddard Court, but I couldn’t find the negative. I’ll substitute this young woman with a boy instead.

Is this Milton Ueleke?

I don’t know for sure, but this pipe-chomping man looks like “Uncle Milty” Ueleke, science teacher at Central High School.

It’s the season

If you want to leave me a lump of coal or something better, click on the yellow DONATE button at the top right of the page.

I had a lab tech who would always give me a lump of coal as a present. I should have saved them for the fireplace.

December 18, 2013

Missourian Crime News

I’ve been working my way through the seven weeks of newspapers that stacked up while I was out in the Midwest. Maybe it’s just because I’m getting a concentrated dose of local news, but it seems like every paper has a story about multiple people being shot, stabbed, bludgeoned or poisoned. Cops shoot perps; perps shoot at cops.

The big story for several days was a woman who went missing; her body was found with her head and fingers cut off and abandoned out in the swamps. Cops, who had been staking out her doctor husband, saw some of his relatives removing something large from his house and discovered it was his body, dead from an overdose.

It was refreshing to step back in time to these photos and a crime account in The Missourian September 18, 1967, by comparison:

“A squirrel hunter, Charles H. Meyer of Gordonville, Sunday stumbled onto what was thought to be stolen goods near Gordonville. Loading the goods onto a truck are from left, Deputy Sheriff Bill Sperling, Larry Meyer, son of the hunter, Deputy Vernon Sebastian, Deputy Jon Knehans and Mr. Meyer.” The story ran on P3A, not the front page, but it was still big news.

Burglary goods in briar patch

The Cape County Sheriff’s Department Sunday recovered items estimated to be worth $500 to $600 which were taken in a burglary August 5. The items, found by Charles Myers, in a woods on his farm as he was squirrel hunting, were believed taken from the R.L. Hanning farm near Whitewater.

The Sheriff’s Department said the loot consisted mostly of electrical equipment, appliances and tools and were spotted by Mr. Myers wrapped in a tarpaulin in a briar patch.

Chief Deputy Wm. A. Sperling said the briars were 12 and 14 feet tall and it was difficult to even open a truck door after backing in to pick up the recovered items.

He said the loot was stashed not far from Route Z west of Gordonville, but could not be seen from the roadway because of the thick foliage. Mr. Myers, however, was hunting further back in the woods and spotted the tarpaulin in the briar patch, Mr. Sperling said.

Wrong AND inconsistent

There was some uncharacteristically sloppy editing in this story. The last name of the hunter and his son was spelled “Meyer” in the photo cutline, and “Myers” in the story. Chief Deputy Wm. (Missourian style, for whatever reason, was to abbreviate William) A. Sperling was referred to as “Mr. Sperling” later in the story. I’m pretty sure somebody got a crankygram from jBlue when he read the paper. Being wrong was bad, but being wrong AND inconsistent was unforgivable. The first error was probably the reporter; the second error meant both the reporter and the copy editor weren’t paying attention to detail.