Stories from Sunday, July 8, 2012

By LEONNA HEURING SEMO News Service DUDLEY, Mo. -- A mild winter and early spring have created a plentiful peach crop in Southeast Missouri as some varieties have been available for over a month now. "The peaches that we're picking right now we usually pick toward the end of July so we're about three or four weeks early," said Janet Johns, who runs her family's business, Cates Orchard in Dudley...

By COREY WILLIAMS and DINESH RAMDE Associated Press DETROIT (AP) - When the air conditioner stopped in Ashley Jackson's Southfield, Mich., home, so too did normal conversations and nightly rest. "Inside the house it was 91 degrees. ... I wasn't talking to anybody. Nobody was talking to anybody," said Jackson, 23, who works as a short-order cook in Detroit. "We mostly slept, but it was hard to sleep because of the heat. I probably got about four hours of sleep each night."...

Marshall Mack Rankin, 84, of Benton, Mo., formerly of Cape Girardeau, beloved husband, father and grandfather went to be with Jesus, July 6, 2012 at his home surrounded by family. He was born Sunday, October 30, 1927 in St. Louis, MO to the late Willis...

By NOREEN HYSLOP Managing Editor Monicka Gustafsson was a girl of 17 when she first came to America on a Girl Scout visit from her home in Sweden. It was 1968. "I was involved in Girl Scouts back home," she explains. "I came over with 11 other scouts to spend two months in the country learning about the American culture and about the state of Missouri."...