Cape Girardeau History and Photos
News photos that have grown whiskers and have become history
This is a little different from my usual Memorial Day photos of flags and grave markers for veterans.
I was making the rounds of cemeteries for Mother’s Day when I approached this statue at St. Mary’s Cemetery from the back side. The yellow flowers, blue sky and the shadows that modeled the figures caused me to pause and roll down the window.
I’ve been here before.
I was alone walking around in St. Mary’s Cemetery looking at graves of servicemen Friday afternoon. I was looking for a specific grave, but didn’t run across it.
What I did find in just about a third of the graveyard was the final resting place of many men who served in our country’s various conflicts, then came back to rejoin their community. Look at how many bronze markers are catching the late afternoon sun. You can click on the photos to make them larger. Here are just a few of the markers and the men they represent.
An obituary in The Southeast Missourian on Sept. 30, 1980, said that Adolph C. Halter had served in the Army in Europe. He worked as a mechanic at Ford Groves Motor Company until he retired due to ill health.
James “Pat” Tlapek earned a long obit in the June 28, 2016, Missourian. It was interesting that his military past didn’t even get a mention, maybe because he had accomplished so many other things in his life.
[He] “took a small auto-parts store in Cape Girardeau and watched it grow into business that spans four states. He also contributed to the community through time and donations throughout his life. Tlapek bought Auto Tire and Parts in 1948, when it was one store in Cape Girardeau. Over the years, he expanded, opening a store in Sikeston, Missouri, then adding a parts warehouse. He sold the business to his son John Tlapek in the 1980s, but he remained involved in the company. It has grown to 49 stores in four states with more than 300 employees.”
A March 14, 2012, Missourian obituary said that Paul Scherer Sr., was born in Advance in 1920, and served in the Army Air Corps during World War II. It reported that he was production manager at Davis Electric, worked as a carpenter, and was an avid gardener.
The Dec. 31, 1981, obit said that John W. Byrne came to Cape Girardeau with the Phillips Petroleum Co., and later became assistant administrator at St. Francis Medical Center. He moved to Jefferson City in 1975, and became medical services coordinator for the Missouri Department of Corrections.
Freeman Eugene “Gene” Moyers, served in the Air Force during both the Korean and Vietnam wars. After he retired as a master sergeant in 1970, he worked for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. He was superintendent of Trail of Tears State Park for three years.
Leon Jansen served aboard a Coast Guard patrol frigate during World War II. When he returned home, worked for Midwest Dairy. In 1959, he started B&J Refrigeration. He established Jaymac Equipment in 1963, which was one of the longest-established Carrier dealers in the country.
Merlin B. Schloss served with the Air Force in England, France and Germany from 1943 to 1946. Mr. Schloss worked as a route salesman for Locke Distributing for 25 years, then for Bluff City Beer, until he retired in 1977. He worked part-time for Bi-State Southern Oil Co. after retiring.
John W. Dean, spent 18 years with the Army Nurse Corps, served in both Korea and Vietnam, and retired with the rank of major. He was director of nursing at St. Francis Medical Center for two years, then opened the Sub and Suds in 1978.
I had to pause a few extra minutes in front of Ray Seyer’s stone. I didn’t have to look up his obituary. I knew him as Wife Lila’s favorite uncle. He was the consummate storyteller. I wrote at the time of his death, “You could tell when Ray was going to let loose with a good one by the way he’d get this half-grin with his lower lip pooched out just a little bit; then the crinkles would show up in the corners of his eyes. That’s a sign of a man who has laughed well and often.”
I had the pleasure of spending an afternoon with Lila, Ray, Mother, and Aunt Rose Mary. I had the foresight to keep a video camera running while Ray was talking about growing up in Swampeast Missouri, serving in the Navy and developing a low opinion of Rush Limbaugh. You can find them at this link.
I posted to Facebook last night that it was going to feel strange waking up at 1618 Kingsway Drive and not having a plastic or real Easter egg waiting for me to find.
After sleeping uncharacteristically late, even by my standards, I eventually had to get the day going.
While the bacon was frying, I slipped out the car to pick up something. When I walked back to the house, this is what was waiting in the flowerbed next to the front door.
Last fall, I did a post on finding The Last Rose of Summer. I felt better seeing The First Tulip of Spring.
While I was trying to figure out how to best compose the tulip picture, I saw something pink on the right-hand side of the frame. What is that?
When I got closer to it, it turned out to be a broken piece of an ancient Easter egg. No telling how long that had been hiding waiting for me to find it one last time.
Mother was religious about decorating the graves of relatives in tiny rural cemeteries scattered all over Cape and Stoddard counties. One of her concerns was who would remember them after she was gone.
I decided that the tulip, some cuttings from the flowering trees and bushes from the yard and the old Easter egg would show I hadn’t forgotten. I can scratch flower arranger off my list of possible vocations, but I hope the thought counts.
The next stop was St. Mary’s Cemetery to mark Wife Lila’s Mother’s grave.
Just around the corner from Lucille Perry is the stone for Lila’s Uncle and Aunt, Ray and Rose Mary Seyer. They died so recently their stone hasn’t been engraved with their death dates, and the Missouri clay hasn’t settled and been covered with grass yet.
The couple were like father and mother to Lila, I could have listened to Ray spin yarns about growing up in Swampeast Missouri. They were good folks.
Rose Mary died October 31 of last year, and Ray followed March 17, 2016. Maybe Mother’s yard will have enough flowers that I can leave more than a single tulip the next time I visit.
Easter Sunday is a good day to look back at some of the crosses I’ve photographed over the years. We’ll start off with an aerial photo of Bald Knob Cross in Illinois at Alto Pass. Here’s how the photo was taken (and saved in the darkroom).
Here’s the cross from the ground.
The Ft. Jefferson Cross at the Confluence in Wickliffe is pretty at night. By the way you CAN make the images larger by clicking on them.
The Cape LaCroix Creek marker has been a rolling stone looking for a home.
When I took this photograph in the mid-1960s, the angel in the picture had wings and arms. She was vandalized twenty years later.
Elder B.A. Armour’s faith is as important to him today as it was when I photographed him baptizing people in the Mississippi River off New Madrid in 1967.
Elder Armour is on the left, and J.C. Pullen is on the right. The congregants marched from the Church of God in Christ church, through downtown New Madrid, and down to the river.
I photographed this cross at St. Mary’s Cemetery twice – almost exactly 48 years apart.
Ken Saunders, a British citizen, walked across the country trying to convince people that Judas really wasn’t a bad guy. He liked what he saw of Missouri.
This old wooden cross is in the Dutchtown Cemetery on a ridge overlooking the slowly diminishing community below it. The dead outnumber the living.
I was really planning to shoot Fourth of July fireworks, but St. Vincent’s Church at sunset caught my eye.
This Crucifix in Altenburg’s Trinity Lutheran Church, was made in Oberammergau, Germany, and came over with the Saxons in 1839. The Last Supper was installed in the altar in 1938.
The Guardian Angel Catholic Church in Oran is one of the most ornate houses of worship in the area.