It seems like Almost Yesterday that the last of the unplanned and unscheduled steamboat races occurred on the Mississippi.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that the territory Americans know as Texas began – from its origins in Southeast Missouri.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that the landscape of Cape Girardeau featured a number of special places where residents could relax and enjoy a pleasant change of scenery. In the middle of the nineteenth century Franck’s Gardens on the hill along Jackson Road, now Broadway, was such a place.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that Miss Eliza Ann Carleton began a log cabin college north of Farmington, Missouri. Her goal was to establish a college of high quality for the young people of the region.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that the Aetna Powder Company plant at Fayville, Illinois exploded.

At 7:52 a.m. on May 20, 1927, Lindbergh took off in his plane, “The Spirit of St. Louis,” barely clearing the trees surrounding Roosevelt Field in New York, and with two canteens of water, five sandwiches, 450 gallons of gasoline in five separate tanks, no windshield in his plane, only two small side windows and a periscope from which to see ----- he headed east towards France.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that James T. Conway was the 34th Commandant of the United States Martine Corp and a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that the State College Golden Eagles Marching Band became national media stars. In 1971, the 160 member Golden Eagles band was selected to perform at the Super Bowl in Miami, Florida.

It seems like Almost Yesterday that intercollegiate debate began on the campus of Southeast Missouri Normal School. A turning point in that process was the arrival on campus of Professor Arthur Winn Vaughn, who served as the motivation for the expansion of debate from an on-campus activity to competition with other colleges.

It seems like almost yesterday that a large weather front stalled over the Ohio Valley, covering much of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky. Heavy rain fell during the first three weeks of January, 1937, elevating the Ohio River to record levels from Pittsburgh to Cairo, and into the lower Mississippi.