Flood waters have begun to recede in Southern Illinois in and around Cairo following concentrated efforts by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and others, but plenty of work remains to be done. (More info and background here: http://thesouthern.com/news/national/article_56caf9fc-feea-5bb3-9f49-1f85096096ca.html)
In an interesting coincidence, Illinois Times editor Fletcher Farrar recently found some old newspapers from 1937 underneath the linoleum in a house he's renovating, and one of the papers contains a couple of stories about flooding in Cairo and the rest of Southern Illinois during that time.
The paper is the Feb. 1, 1937 edition of the Chicago American, an evening paper featuring the front page headline "INCHES KEEP FLOOD FROM CAIRO".
Click the links below to see scans of the articles. (Warning: the files are big, so be patient!) The first two pictures are the first and second halves of the same story about flooding in Cairo, while the third picture is about then-Governor Henry Horner's relief efforts.
http://www.illinoistimes.com/Springfield/file-91-.jpg
