Stories from Tuesday, May 3, 2022

In 1996, area code 573 — including residents in Poplar Bluff and all of Southeast Missouri — was put into service when area code 314 began to run out of available telephone numbers because of cellular phones, fax machines, computer modems and pagers...

A burial of ashes for the late Chuck Haga will be at 1 p.m. Saturday, May 14 in the Poplar Bluff City Cemetery in Poplar Bluff with Sean Moore officiating. If raining, the ashes burial service will be postponed. A memorial will follow at 2 p.m. at the Elks Lodge #2452 located at 2452 Highway 67 North in Poplar Bluff...

City officials, Butler and Stoddard county emergency management agencies and community members took time on Monday to honor the 86 victims of the May 9, 1927, tornado, and presented new technology capable of saving lives in the modern era. A new grant will enable $70,000 of improvements to the county’s tornado sirens, said Robbie Myers, Butler County EMA director. ...

Farmers are receiving more for their row crops than in recent years, but that fact is not directly leading to more money in their pockets for a number of reasons. From 2014 through 2020, agriculture commodity prices — what a farmer receives for cotton, soybeans, corn and other crops — tanked. According to U.S. Department of Agriculture figures:...

Herbert Lee Proctor Sr., 82, of Poplar Bluff, Missouri passed away due to heart complications on Friday, April 29, 2022, at Barnes Hospital in Saint Louis. Missouri.   Herbert, son of the late Irene Smith and the late Lloyd Proctor was born Aug. 20, 1939, in Romulus, Michigan. Herbert graduated high school from Romulus High School in 1956. Immediately after graduation, Herbert joined the United States Marine Corps, attending basic training at Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego, California. Herbert proudly served 10 years in the Marine Corps as helicopter crew chief before being honorably discharged.. ...

Marilyn “Lynn” Olsen passed away Saturday, April 30, 2022, in Poplar Bluff, Missouri. She was born Aug. 24, 1926, in Palo Alto, California to Nelson and Louise (Parker) Case. She married Fred Olsen Aug. 27, 1955, in Gamaliel, Arkansas. Lynn is survived by two daughters, Kerry Wilson of Poplar Bluff, Missouri, and Vicki (Tim) Simpson of Owasso, Oklahoma; one son, Dr. ...

Parents Cristen Myers and Jerry Foster organized a protest in April in Puxico to raise awareness of the Puxico School District dress code policy. The parents say they assembled this protest on April 12 because their daughter has received dress code violations over an outfit that she had worn multiple times before in the current school year...

After over a decade of work, Animal Welfare Alliance of Southeast Missouri has a permanent home in the former Hillcrest Animal Hospital. AWA’s goal of a permanent location felt out of reach for years, according to organizers. No building fit their needs, so the organization eventually bought land and planned to embark on the costly mission of constructing its own headquarters...

The Poplar Bluff City Council is expected to select a demolition company May 16 for the removal of a portion of a downtown parking garage and a vacant Main Street building. The city received three bids, all slightly under the project estimate, for the project, according to information presented Monday to the city council during their regular meeting...