Common Pleas Courthouse Archives

May 28, 2019May 28, 2019

Cape’s Conflicted Past

This statue of a member of the United States Colored Troop regiments will be unveiled officially on June 8, 2019. It’s located on Ivers Square on the Common Pleas Courthouse grounds. Ironically, the statue is located in front of the old Carnegie Library, which is close to where slaves were auctioned off in Cape Girardeau.

The square is named for James Ivers, who was owned by E.W. Harris for 25 years, then was sold for $800 to a young up-and-comer John Ivers, Jr. John Ivers eventually bought James’ wife, Harriet, and the couple’s three children, Washington, Stella and Fanny.

In the spring of 1863, when official enlistment for men of color opened, James joined up and was sent to Helena, Arkansas. Before he saw action, he died of consumption in the fall of that year.

You can read more about James’ life in Denise Lincoln’s column in The Southeast Missourian.

A snapshot of Cape during the Civil War

This photo contains monuments to the Confederate States of America, a Union soldier, and the new statue recognizing the sacrifices made by troops of color.

The Common Pleas Courthouse served as the Union headquarters when the city was under martial law. A guerrilla who was being held in the dungeon basement of the building was lynched and hung.

Not the original soldier

This isn’t the Union soldier I photographed in 1967. A tree fell on it, and smashed it to more than 200 pieces in 2003. The pieces were painstakingly put back together and a new statue molded from them.

Here is a bit of the history of the statue.

Vietnam veterans recognized

This monument is in honor of service personnel who served in Vietnam. You can see some our classmates who didn’t return listed on the Freedom Corner in Capaha Park, along with servicemen from earlier World Wars.

Gary Schemel, the first Central classmate casualty, died in 1965
Bob Taylor, killed in 1968

Brookside War Memorial

If you are in Jackson, it’s worth stopping by the Brookside War Memorial.

January 6, 2018January 13, 2018

2017 Holiday Decorations

Yeah, I KNOW Christmas and New Year’s have passed, but if stores can stock Valentine’s Day candy and Easter bunnies before the first week of 2018 is over, then I can stretch the Happy Holidays a bit in the other direction. Main Street was spiffed up a little this year. Here’s how Main and Broadway looked from high over the city at Fort A. (Click on the photos to make them larger.)

Some folks were in short sleeves

I figured I should have the bridge in at least one shot, so here it is. I was a little chilly up on the hill, but I saw several brave souls wandering around in short sleeves.

From Common Pleas Courthouse

The color balance is a bit funky, but here’s what downtown looked like from the steps of the Common Pleas Courthouse.

Looking to the north

This was taken from the south Main Street parking lot, almost in front of Hutson’s Furniture. The building on the left would have been the old Woolworth’s building.

South from Middle Main

This was taken at the block north of Themis (see the ugly clock), looking to the south.

Buckner-Ragsdale

This is a familiar icon for anybody who bought a pair of jeans that came with a Tuf-Nut knife.

October 19, 2014

Parking Downtown and at Casino

You wouldn’t have had to fight for parking at noon-thirty on Wednesday August 13 when Ernie Chiles and I flew over the Isle Cape Girardeau Casino.

I didn’t look at it under a magnifying glass, but I DID blow it up a bit on the screen to let me count about 244 cars, two buses and what might be an RV in the parking lots. (Click on the photos to make them larger.)

Here are some earlier posts about the casino and shoe factory area.

Downtown parking

I looked at a series of frames that showed the downtown shopping area parking lots from the city lot south of Independence to the two lots north of Broadway, plus Water Street and east of Spanish Street. The photos were taken on the same pass, just minutes before the Casino photo. I counted about 210 vehicles ion the downtown shopping district.

[I cheated a bit. Because of the angle, I couldn’t see cars parked on the east side of Main, so I doubled the number of cars parked on the west side, assuming that the same number of parking spaces were occupied on that side.]

(Sorry for the cloud shadows at the top left. I tried get Ernie to lasso them and drag them out of the way, but he said that kind of thing was out of his pay grade.

It would be interesting to know how many of the cars in both locations were owned by employees rather than customers.

Other downtown aerials

June 4, 2014

View from the 200 Block

I saw Tim Kincaid from Edgewater Glass doing some work on what is now the Mount Moriah Missionary Church and decided to pull into the parking lot. I got a quick look inside the church and had good intentions of going back to shoot the interior, but that will have to wait until the next trip to Cape.

It looks like Boyd Hobbs, who painted the church steeple in 1967, needs to come back to put on a new coat.

Common Pleas Courthouse

It’s early enough in the spring that there was a clear view of the Common Pleas Courthouse. When I photographed the 200 block of Broadway in the late 1960s, it was full of buildings, including the Boy Scout office. It’s all green space these days.

Lots of decks

I had never had a clear view of this house on Bellvue before. That’s quite a collection of decks and tree houses. It’s in the vicinity of Civil War Fort A overlooking the Mississippi River. Click on the photos to make them larger.