Red Wing boots Archives

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

April 5, 2012February 20, 2015

Broadway End-to-End

I was trading some messages with Nicolette Brennan from the City of Cape about a picture of Broadway for a project she’s working on. That got me to thinking about how many Broadway stories I’ve done. I’ve documented the street from the river’s edge to the old Colonial Tavern on the west end. Click on the photos to make them larger and click on the links to go to the original story.

So many teens were dancing at the old Teen Age Club at Themis and Spanish that the floor was bouncing and a city inspector shut ’em down. They moved the dance to the bank parking lot at the corner of Main and Broadway.

Crash at the Colonial Tavern

The Colonial Tavern was my dad’s morning coffee stop where everybody would gather to hash over the previous night’s Cardinal game. A sports car picked this night to plow into the building that was at the west end of Broadway.

The park that got away

A three-acre tract of land on the south side of Broadway east of Hwy 61 was donated by the Doggett family with the understanding that the the land would be developed into a park similar to Dennis Scivally Park on Cape Rock Drive.

The family felt that the tract hadn’t been improved in the past 10 years, so they filed a suit to reclaim the land. A granite marker with the name “Doggett Park” next to the Masonic Temple parking lot is all that remains of the park.

Crash at Broadway and Fountain

Sometimes what you think is going to be an inconsequential story resonates with readers. Fred Kaefpfer, who was directing traffic at this crash at the corner of Broadway and Fountain, turned out to be Cape’s singing policeman. It became one of the most-commented stories of the early blog. The Idan-Ha Hotel shows up in the background of the photo.

Idan-Ha Hotel burns

The Idan-Ha Hotel, which had caught fire in 1968, caught fire again in 1989.

Star Service Station – Cigarettes 25 cents a pack

The Star Service station at the corner of Broadway and Frederick gave stamps with your gas. Ninety stamps would get you $1.50 worth of free gas.

Annie Laurie’s used to be Brinkopf-Howell’s

Niece Laurie Everett’s Annie Laurie’s Antiques, across the street from the Star Service Station used to be a funeral home. It’s the top-rated antique shop in Cape County now. Shivelbines Music, across the street, got a new sign in November.

Bob’s Shoe Service

Bob Fuller’s Bob’s Shoe Service was where I stocked up on Red Wing boots, the ideal footwear for a photographer. They’d shine up acceptably for formal wear (at least as formal as I ever got), but you could wade water and walk on fire with no worries.

507-515 Broadway

The 500 block of Broadway has had an interesting past.

Discovery Playhouse – Walthers’s Furniture

I was glad to see some life around the old Walther’s Furniture Store and Funeral Home. The Discovery Playhouse has become popular in a short period of time. Here is was before it opened.

Lutheran Mural Building razed

When I shot the Discovery Playhouse, I had no idea that the landmark building across the street was going to be torn down within a couple of years. It was best known for the huge blue mural on its side.

Rialto Theater roof collapses

A rainstorm caused the roof of the old Rialto Theater to collapse in 2010. This story contains a bunch of links, including one that tells how I met Wife Lila there when she was working as a cashier. This picture is of the 1964 Homecoming Parade.

Broadway Theater is still impressive

I managed to talk my way into the Broadway Theater on a cold December day. It still has the feel of the premier theater of the city.

What’s going to happen to the Esquire?

When I did this story in October 2011, it looked like the Esquire Theater was going to get new life. A new owner had an ambitious plan to renovate it. The latest stories in The Missourian make it sound like the project is unraveling.

Here’s a piece I did about its art deco history. In September 1965, I used infrared flash and film to capture kids watching The Beatles movie Help! It was the first (and only) time I used that technique.

Pladium / D’Ladiums – it’s still the same

I wasn’t a pool player, but those who were spent their time in the Pladium (now D’Ladiums) across from Houck Stadium or the Pla-Mor, next to Wayne’s Grill and the Esquire. The Beav still rules the roost at D’Ladiums.

Vandeven’s Merchantile

Howard’s Athletic Goods and a handful of other businesses have moved into the building at the corner of Broadway and Pacific over the years, but it’ll always be Vandeven’s Merchantile to me.

It dawns on me that I have even more photographs along Broadway – way too many to inflict on you in one shot. I’ll hold off putting up the rest of them until another day. Don’t forget to click on the links to see the original stories.

February 3, 2012

Missouri Highway Patrol

I’d rather see these Missouri Highway Patrol troopers here than in my rearview mirror with their red lights spinning. The negative sleeve is dated January 5, 1967, but I didn’t see it in the paper around that date. I thought it might have been taken for the 1967 Achievement Edition and, in fact, there was a story about the Troop E in the February 21 paper. These aren’t the photos that ran with the story, though.

At some time or another, I ran into just about every trooper that worked the counties around Cape, but these guys don’t look familiar. The trooper I knew best was Norman Copeland. He should have been a recruiting poster for what a Highway Patrolman should look like.

How NOT to shoot a photo

This is not how to shoot a photo of a bunch of people. I violated the newspaper rule of thumb that a person’s head should be at least the size of a nickle in the print. The subjects are way too small.

My fashion faux pas

I should have remembered that lesson when I moved to Ohio.

The society editor at The Athens Messenger went to a lot of trouble to round up some college girls to model some clothes for a fashion shoot. I don’t like to set up pictures and my idea of fashion is blue jeans and Red Wing boots, so I probably should have handed the assignment off to Bob Rogers, the other photographer. Still, I loaded the gals into my car and we headed off to a state park where we had a great afternoon shooting all kinds of artsy stuff.

The next morning, I dropped off the prints and waited for the praise for a job well done. Marge Straight, the soc editor, looked at them and, in her usual quiet, diplomatic way, said, “Ken these are very nice, but the idea of a fashion shoot is to show the clothes.” Luckily the models were amenable to another day frolicking in the woods.

I used to tell my staff that I’d never ask them to shoot an assignment that I hadn’t shot or wouldn’t be willing to shoot. I lied. I dodged every opportunity to go to New York for the annual fashion shoots.