News photos that have grown whiskers and have become history
I mentioned in the last post that the Marquette Natatorium was sporting new coat of paint when we drove past it Easter Sunday. I commented that the only thing it needed was to have the black accent applied to the name.
When I drove past it this morning, someone had filled in the black. It looks good as new.
Don’t worry. This is the last post on the Marquette Natatorium for a long time. Unless, of course, they announce that it’s turning back into a swimming pool.
At the end of January, I posted a picture of the Marquette Natatorium taken in October 2009 paired with a photo my wife’s niece, Laurie Evertt (of Annie Laurie’s Antiques), shot January 29 of this year. Her photo (above) showed it looking pretty shabby.
The was some speculation that the building might be headed for the wrecking ball, but we had a pleasant surprise when we drove past the place on Easter. It was sporting a spiffy new paint job.
It needs some black paint inside the carved name to make it look like new.
It’s no longer being used as a swimming pool, but it appears the building will be around for us to appreciate for a few more years.
When I was in Cape last fall, I wrote a piece for my bike blog about my favorite ride: the 26-mile run from Cape to Altenburg.
I try to stop in at the Lutheran Heritage Center and Museum whenever it’s open. Their permanent collections are full of fascinating artifacts of the German communities. I see something new every time I visit. The staff is friendly and knowledgeable. It’s free, but your conscience should twitch a little if you don’t throw SOMETHING in the donation box on the way out the door.
I was planning on doing a series on cool stuff to see in Perry County, but the Easter bonnet theme caused me to jump the gun.
The current exhibit features 100 historic hats and related photographs and other artifacts. It is the inaugural celebration of the Perry County Lutheran Historical Society’s centennial year as an historical society.
These aren’t hats from some far-off place. These are hats worn by local women who loaned them to the center just like they loaned their aprons to the exhibit I saw last fall. Knowing that the hats were worn by real women to Perry County church services or club meetings make them come to life for me.
The Perry County Lutheran Historical Society was organized in 1910 to preserve, interpret and promote the Log Cabin Seminary. The exhibit is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily. Bus tours and groups are welcome.
I wasn’t in Missouri for the Christmas Tree display between Nov. 18 and Jan. 5.
My Mother mentioned to the tour guide that it hasn’t been too long ago that women didn’t feel dressed unless they were wearing a hat and gloves.
Maybe I’ve been in Florida too long, but this one makes me think of Brain Coral
You didn’t want to have to chase one of these intricately-designed hats down the street on a windy day, so you used hat pins to hold it on. I am reasonably sure you couldn’t board a plane wearing one of these today. Some of those pins looked to be as much as eight inches long. I can see now how they were good tools for defending one’s honor.
View Cape Girardeau to Altenburg Bike Route in a larger map
There are more direct ways, but the way I go by bicycle is a great route. It takes you through some beautiful farming country that’s just now greening out. If you click on the map, it’ll make it larger. You can pan and zoom to see more detail.
You’ll pass farm houses that have to be closer to 200 years old than 100. You’ll cringe when you come to some bridges that are marked as one-lane when you recall that we drove on them as two-lane bridges at 60 mph.
The Tour of Missouri rode a good portion of this route. When you come to some of the steeper hills, think of climbing them under your own power on a bicycle. When you come to some of the sharper curves, think of taking them with 120 of your closest friends on all sides of you in a game of chicken.
The Lutheran Heritage Center and Museum has an easy to navigate, uncluttered web site with lots of information. If you make the trip, tell them you heard about them here.
It was a Good Friday, the religious holiday, and it was a Good Friday for Midwesterners looking for nice day after a long winter.
Trees and flowers were blooming and green was popping out all over. Lawn mowers were puttering away in neighborhood yards.
A healthy crowd, many in shorts and T-shirts, turned out to watch a double header between SEMO and Western Kentucky. (SEMO won the first game 17-9 and the second 7-4, if anyone cares). I love the sound of baseball games, but I still haven’t gotten used to the “CLINK” of aluminum bats. There’s something wrong about it.
Late in 1959, Dad brought home a Bell & Howell 8mm movie camera outfit. In the days before Super-8, 8mm cameras actually used 16mm film. You’d shoot the first half of the roll, open up the camera, flip the film over and shoot the rest of your movie on the other half of the film. The processor would develop it, split it down the middle and splice the two 25-foot lengths into one 50-footer.
This wasn’t an ideal setup. First off, it was easy to fog the film when you were doing the open-the-camera, rethread-the-film operation. Then, when you went to project it, only one side of the film had sprockets to pull it through the projector. That made it easy for the film to slip off. If you didn’t get to it in time, the heat from the projector bulb would burn a hole right through the film.
Brother Mark took on the task of converting the 8mm film to VHS tapes ab0ut 15 years ago. It wasn’t a high tech solution. I think he mostly took a picture of a moving picture. I didn’t complain. At least, I didn’t have to do it.
With VHS going the way of 8mm, I got a good deal on a VCR that outputs to a computer USB port. Considering that the original film quality wasn’t great to begin with, and that Mark’s copy didn’t improve things, the digital result is acceptable if you don’t mind fuzzy, blow-out images.
I say that to lower expectations.
Bro Mark appears in these pictures along with his Trinity Lutheran School kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Tickel, so Mother and I are guessing that this video was taken around 1961. Mark is the cute kid who can’t seem to keep his shoes on. The Capaha Park Band Shell is in a few frames.
Since we normally come home in October to celebrate my mother’s Birthday Season, we get to see the fall colors. I had forgotten how much I loved seeing the countryside come to life in the spring. It almost makes you forget those gray, gloomy days.
Almost.