state, United States
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- Missouri - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11)
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Also known as: Show Me State
Written by
Edwin J. Westermann,
Milton D. Rafferty•All
Fact-checked by
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Last Updated: •Article History
Missouri, constituent state of the United States of America. To the north lies Iowa; across the Mississippi River to the east, Illinois, Kentucky, and Tennessee; to the south, Arkansas; and to the west, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska. With the exception of Tennessee, Missouri has more neighbouring states than any other U.S. state. Bisecting the state is the Missouri River, flowing from Kansas City in the west, through the state’s capital, Jefferson City, in the centre, to just above St. Louis in the east, where it joins the Mississippi. Missouri was the name of a group of indigenous people who lived in the area at the time of European settlement; the French named the river after the native community, and the river, in turn, gave its name to the state.
Facts & Stats
Capital, Population, Government...
Facts & Stats
See article: flag of Missouri
Seal of Missouri
Missouri: state bird
Missouri: state flower
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- Capital:
- Jefferson City
- Population:
- (2020) 6,154,913; (2023 est.) 6,196,156
- Governor:
- Mike Parson (Republican)
- Date Of Admission:
- August 10, 1821
- U.S. Senators:
- Josh Hawley (Republican)
- Roy Blunt (Republican)
Located near the centre of the conterminous United States, Missouri is the meeting place of the eastern timberlands and western prairies and of the southern cotton fields and the northern cornfields. It has represented the political and social sentiments of a border state since its admission as the 24th member of the union on August 10, 1821. The question of its admission as a slave state or as a free state produced in the U.S. Congress the Missouri Compromise (1820), which regulated the spread of slavery in the western territories.
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Missouri was the westernmost state of the union until the admission of Texas in 1845, and for decades it served as the eastern terminus of the Santa Fe and Oregon trails. For the western territories, St. Louis, one of Missouri’s largest cities, long was the closest contact with the culture and more settled society of the eastern states. For the eastern United States, Missouri had a reputation as the chief gateway to points west.
Missouri embodies a unique but dynamic balance between the urban and the rural and between the liberal and the conservative. The state ranks high in the United States in terms of urbanization and industrial activity, but it also maintains a vigorous and diversified agriculture. Numerous conservative characteristics of the rural life that predominated prior to the 1930s have been retained into the 21st century; indeed, Missouri’s nickname, the Show-Me State, suggests a tradition of skepticism regarding change. Area 69,707 square miles (180,540 square km). Population (2020) 6,154,913; (2023 est.) 6,196,156.
Land
Relief
The part of Missouri that lies north of the Missouri River was once glaciated. In this area the land is characterized by gently rolling hills, fertile plains, and well-watered prairie country. South of the Missouri, a large portion of the state lies in the Ozark Mountains. Except in the extreme southeastern corner of Missouri—including the southern extension, commonly called the “Bootheel”—and along the western boundary, the land in this region is rough and hilly, with some deep, narrow valleys and clear, swift streams. It is an area abounding with caves and extraordinarily large natural springs. Much of the land is 1,000 to 1,400 feet (300 to 425 metres) above sea level, although near the western border the elevations rarely rise above 800 feet (250 metres). About 90 miles (145 km) south of St. Louis is Taum Sauk Mountain; with an elevation of 1,772 feet (540 metres), it is the highest point in the state. In far southeastern Missouri lies a part of the alluvial plain of the Mississippi River, where elevations are less than 500 feet (150 metres). On the southwestern edge of this region is the state’s lowest point, where the St. Francis River flows from the Missouri Bootheel into Arkansas at an elevation of about 230 feet (70 metres).
The St. Francois Mountains in the eastern Ozarks exhibit igneous granite and rhyolite outcroppings, while the rest of the state is underlain by sedimentary rocks—mainly limestones, dolomites, sandstone, and shale. Missouri is tectonically stable except for the southeastern portion, where small earth tremors occur. The possibility of another devastating earthquake of a magnitude comparable to those centred at New Madrid in 1811–12 cannot be discounted.
Drainage and soils
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Drainage and soil conditions permit farming in all of Missouri’s counties, although the Ozark Mountain region mainly supports livestock and poultry farming because of the region’s thin soil. Northern Missouri, much of it covered by rich glacial and loessial soils, is generally well drained. The alluvial soils in the bottomlands along the many rivers and streams, which are among the most extensive in the country, also add to the farming potentiality. Except for the rivers that flow generally southeasterly into the Mississippi, many through Arkansas, the Missouri River drains most of the state.
Missouri’s largest lakes were created by damming rivers and streams. The Lake of the Ozarks, impounded by the Bagnell Dam on the Osage River, has an area of 93 square miles (241 square km) and a shoreline of some 1,375 miles (2,200 km); it is among the largest man-made lakes in the country. Although most of Missouri’s artificial lakes were built primarily to furnish hydroelectric power and to prevent flooding, they also provide the state with excellent recreational resources.
