Cape Girardeau History and Photos

October 19, 2013

St. Francis Addition

It seems like every time I come to Cape the hospitals are getting bigger.

Wife Lila thought I needed new shoes.

(The old ones were only four years old. I had to admit that the right one felt somewhat uncomfortable, but then I found the problem was a nail that had gone all the way through the sole and insole and was sticking up about 1/16 of an inch into the footbed. I tried to convince her that taking out the nail would make them perfectly serviceable for another four years, but she disagreed. For what it’s worth, my old Red Wing work boots would have shrugged that nail off like nobody’s business.)

Anyway, on the way to the shoe emporium, I saw that another big piece of St. Francis Hospital had jumped out of the ground since my last visit.

$127 Million project

When I photographed the site in February, I found a Missourian story that said this was part of a $127 million expansion and renovation project.

Earlier St. Francis stories

October 18, 2013February 20, 2015

View of Seminary Lost

Wife Lila wanted to go to the Mississippi River overlook that used to be the traffic bridge. Along the way, we saw that not only had the historic handball courts been demolished, but that the beautiful view of the St. Vincent’s Seminary was also being lost. Sorry for the quality of the photo: it was the wrong time of day to shoot in that direction.

This is what you used to see

This nice, peaceful green space is what used to welcome you to Cape when you crossed the bridge.

Here’s what is going up

You’ll never know what the old seminary looked like from the south side. Let’s hear it for SEMO’s historic preservation program.

Earlier rants and stories

October 18, 2013

Birthday Season #92

October 17 marked the high point of Mother’s extended Birthday Season, which kicked off way back in August when Steinhoffs from Oklahoma, Florida and Missouri stopped in. Mother is showing Brother Mark a letter she got from a hearing aid company offering her a discount on a hearing aid. “I thought you guys were getting together to buy me a hearing aid.”

Still has the lung power

She might have candles on her cake representing 92 years, but she can still puff them out with a single breath of air. Click on the photo to watch her blow out the candles. (This is a fairly large file, so it might take a little while to load.)

We were going to fill the cake with a full 92 candles, but the firefighters in the station across the street saw the delivery truck from Acme Birthday Candle Company pull up and intervened.

Other Birthday Seasons

October 17, 2013

Gone Girl Filming

Based on what I’ve seen in The Missourian and Facebook, Cape has gone gaga over the Gone Girl movie being filmed there. There were daily postings of the Common Pleas Courthouse terraces being covered with mock snow, the production’s caterers, actors exercising in local gyms, etc., etc., etc.

I was going to do all I could to avoid covering any aspect of it, but I happened to spot a gaggle of what looked like TV satellite trucks in a parking lot on Independence just west of West End Blvd. on my way to the grocery store. Wednesday afternoon, I figured I’d take a run by there to see if anyone was around.

I drove past signs saying “Transportation Parking Only” and “Absolutely No Public Parking.” I mean, my VAN is transportation, right? And if I don’t shut my motor off, I’m not parking, right? Besides, there was nobody around to be offended and parking abounded.

Something is strange here

The truck in the front says KOMO 4 Seattle News. That’s a long way from home. Google confirms that a KOMO 4 exists in Seattle, though.

Miles of wire

This shot picks up pallets of wire and more news vans. There’s a problem with KBDP: Google can’t find it. The same was true in another photo. WMNB 5 Live, with California tags, comes back as a Russian media group. KPLR 11 Fox 2 looks fake, too. There are Fox 2 stations in St. Louis and Detroit, but neither have the callsign KPLR. I’m going to assume these are prop vehicles.

Seeing all that wire reminded me of a time when I shot production stills for a video company doing a series of commercials. The effects those guys could do with simple lighting was amazing. I never looked at a movie the same way again.

Celebrity stakeouts

I worked for a city editor once who was starstruck. At even a whiff of celebrity, he’d have one of us staking out a house for days.

I hated that kind of thing, so I’d knock on the door and say, “I’m Ken Steinhoff from The Post. I’d really like to have five minutes with Joe Star to take a nice portrait to get the city editor off my back. If he really doesn’t want his picture taken, I’ll respect his privacy and not lurk around peering through hedges. I’ll be the guy sitting in the shade reading a book. If he doesn’t want to be seen, have him go out the back.”

I did manage to shoot some nice portraits of celebs over the years, but not by skulking in the bushes.

So, if I run into a movie shoot, I’ll take a few frames, but I’m not going looking for the action.