Is Missouri more similar to Iowa or Arkansas? (Kansas City, St. Louis: how much, floor)

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by ShadowCaver

Ya know, now that I think about it more, with the assistance of some liquid barley, it is very clear that Missouri is much more similar to, well:

Missouri and Iowa share an "i" and an "o" = total of 2 letters...
Missouri and Arkansas share two "s's" and a "r" = total of 3 letters...

Therefore, let it be known that Missouri is more similar to Arkansas, yet has many similarities to Iowa too.

I get your joke, but I strongly disagree about Missouri being more similar to Arkansas. St. Louis and Kansas City are far more like cities in Iowa than in Arkansas. In appearance, I agree that the Southern half of Missouri is more similar to Arkansas (the Ozark range and Mississippi Delta). However, the culture and dialect and lifestyle of Southern Missouri is a mix of Midwestern and Southern, but becomes more southern the further south you go. The only definitively southern parts of Missouri to me at least are in the Mississippi Delta and extreme Southwest Missouri, like around Branson. The crops, the dialect, the weather, the lifestyle, and the cuisine are all textbook Southern.

[Nu2pomona]

The little boy said to his marm...."Ar kan sas you if I wanna." His marm answered, "Do, and you'll larn the meanin' of Miz o ree."

[linicx]

I lived in SW Missouri.. I had a yard full of clay and hardpan and rocks. I grow trees by not flowers very will and it didn't matter what I did. I haven't been in every inch of Illinois, so I haven't seen clay. but I have seen a lot of black loam and blank sand. IL is primarily a farm state. The only brick factory I could find - and I do not know if it is production or not - is in Northern Illinois. Illinois was also a coal producing state at one time. St Louis is nothing like the other half of the state The Ozark Mountains exend into Arkansas almost as far as Fayetteville and into Oklahoma a few sbort miles before the area becomes rolling hills and then disappears.

The real diff is politics. in this Mo is more like Ar, and less like Iowa.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by linicx

I lived in SW Missouri.. I had a yard full of clay and hardpan and rocks. I grow trees by not flowers very will and it didn't matter what I did. I haven't been in every inch of Illinois, so I haven't seen clay. but I have seen a lot of black loam and blank sand. IL is primarily a farm state. The only brick factory I could find - and I do not know if it is production or not - is in Northern Illinois. Illinois was also a coal producing state at one time. St Louis is nothing like the other half of the state The Ozark Mountains exend into Arkansas almost as far as Fayetteville and into Oklahoma a few sbort miles before the area becomes rolling hills and then disappears.

The real diff is politics. in this Mo is more like Ar, and less like Iowa.

If that's what you proclaim, then why is Illinois still among the highest in brick production? If you look up brick production, you will notice that Illinois produces even more bricks than Missouri does. It is even higher up on the list than Missouri is. Also, as far as politics goes, Missouri is a swing state and very divided politically, and its largest major cities lean more to the left than the right (STL and KC). Rurally, I agree it is conservative in the rural areas. Arkansas, however for the most part is much more conservative both in its urban and in its rural areas. The only reason I figure it was democratic when Bill Clinton was President was partly because he was from that state and its governor at one time, and almost all presidents always carry their home state in an election. Missouri I would say is definitely more of a farm state, though the Ozark Mountains are anything but farmable. However, around Monett I saw plenty of corn and soybean fields and dairy farms. Most of Missouri's crops are more like Iowa as well. Its main crop productions are corn and soybeans. Tobacco and cotton are grown only in 8 counties or so in the southeast portion of the state. In fact, Missouri is something like second in the nation for soybean production. You could argue the Southern half of the state to be geologically more like Arkansas, but culturally it is has similarities to Southern Illinois. Iowa is the Upper Midwest. Missouri is the Lower Midwest. It's a really tough call to make. That said, I would say that Missouri is definitely more like Illinois and Kansas than it is like Arkansas. It is not a farming state to the degree of Iowa and Illinois, but at least 3/4 of it is farmable. Fayetteville is not that far into Arkansas either. It's less than 100 miles from the Missouri border. It's in the northwestern corner of the state. hence again, the meaning of "Ozark": "toward Arkansas." As far as Oklahoma is concerned, Arkansas is far more like Tennessee and Kentucky than Oklahoma. The majority of the Ozark range is in Missouri. The vast majority of Arkansas is the not in the Ozarks. If you look on a map you will see that. When I was in Joplin and Springfield, while the soil was not the same, it did not really feel like I was in Arkansas. Southwest Missouri is hard to classify. It is like Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Kansas all together in one bunch. For me at least, most of Arkansas seems worlds removed compared to Iowa.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by linicx

I lived in SW Missouri.. I had a yard full of clay and hardpan and rocks. I grow trees by not flowers very will and it didn't matter what I did. I haven't been in every inch of Illinois, so I haven't seen clay. but I have seen a lot of black loam and blank sand. IL is primarily a farm state. The only brick factory I could find - and I do not know if it is production or not - is in Northern Illinois. Illinois was also a coal producing state at one time. St Louis is nothing like the other half of the state The Ozark Mountains exend into Arkansas almost as far as Fayetteville and into Oklahoma a few sbort miles before the area becomes rolling hills and then disappears.

The real diff is politics. in this Mo is more like Ar, and less like Iowa.

So is Missouri. In the Ozarks, there are plenty of dairy farms, vineyards and tomatoes where crops can't grow. And there is some crop production in the Ozarks, I noticed a cornfield near Farmington. Ozark soil if properly taken care of can be made farmable, though it's probably a royal pain. Also, in terms of St. Louis being nothing like the other half of the state, if that was Missouri above the Missouri River you were talking about, you might want to rethink that because most of it is far more like the Northern half than the Southern half. I notice virtually no change when I cross the Missouri River into St. Charles except for the terrain beginning to flatten out more once I get west of Wentzville. The terrain around where Six Flags is bears far less resemblance to the terrain of St. Louis City. Geologically, I would say St. Louis bears far more resemblance to the Northern half of Missouri than the Southern half. It isn't as flat, but it certainly contains fertile soil and loess hills and is far more gently rolling than the Ozarks. No cavernous rock or cliffs are exposed for the most part, and it is rich, rolling prairie and forest. At least 3/4 of St. Louis County and all of St. Louis City fit in better with the Northern half of the state and Illinois...north of the Meramec River, the majority of it feels nothing like the Ozarks other than the forests. Most of it was originally farmland, open prairie and park-like forest. Southwestern and Southern St. Louis County are the beginnings of the Ozark foothills. It should also be noted that Iowa itself has some Ozark-like terrain...in the unglaciated part of the northeastern half, specifically. That part contains farming soil. Even clay soil is relatively fertile. Most of St. Louis and St. Louis County I've noticed contain soil similar to that of Illinois just across the river.

[Hillman]

Ok as far as raising Grain in the Ozarks when I was growing up we raised all our Grain for Stock and then some.But it was a matter of picking rock off the fields all Winter.

Thing is most farmers got Lazy and all they want to do anymore is pasture Cattle.Far easier to go out kick some Hay out and check for calves,get them all up twice a year for shots and everything.

We milked 80 Head by Hand selling Grade C Milk that went for Cheese in Springfield.Had 40 Head of Sows we were selling Feeder Pigs off of.And around 100 Head of Beef Cows.

Plus raised several hundred acres of Wheat,Oats,Barley,Corn,Alfalfa,and Orchard Grass.

And Oh My Gosh we had a so called Puppy Mill with couple hundred Dogs.

But this was like I say when people worked.

hillman

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow73

You could also ask if Arkansas is more similar to Missouri or Mississippi...or Oklahoma... or Lousiana. We only have 5 very geologically distinct land regions in this state.

If you ask me, Arkansas is most similar to Tennessee. Really for any state, it depends on which parts of the state you are in. In my personal opinion, I would have to say Southern Missouri probably when it's all added together is more similar to Arkansas, but the Missouri Ozarks retain strong Midwestern influence all the way down to Springfield and Joplin. My dad is from the area, and when I visited Springfield and Joplin, I did not really think they were that much like Arkansas. Gotta run. Be back later.

[ajf131]

The Northern half of the state, including most of the St. Louis and Kansas City metro areas, is more like Iowa, unquestionably. It lies in the Dissected Till Plains region, and is flat to rolling hills which are big near the rivers and can be karst terrain near them as well. This half is geologically Midwestern to the core. The Ozarks are more of a Missouri deal than an Arkansas deal, one can tell that just by looking on a map. I would say they are Midwestern, southern, and western, and if not the first, definitely the latter two. Missouri contains the overwhelming majority of the Ozarks, and most of the plateaus (Salem and Springfield and St. Francois) barely extend 30 miles into Arkansas. Arkansas is composed of the Ozarks and the Mississippi Delta and the Gulf Plain and the Great Plains. Only about 25% of the state is in the Ozarks. If you wanted to include the Ouachitas, which are usually not included in the Ozarks, this would be between 30-40% of the state. Less than a quarter of Missouri is in the Mississippi Delta. Culturally I see more similarities to Iowa than I do to Arkansas. The cuisine and dialects in the majority of the state, as well as the flora and fauna and climate are more like Iowa.

[ajf131]

Originally Posted by Nu2pomona

The little boy said to his marm...."Ar kan sas you if I wanna." His marm answered, "Do, and you'll larn the meanin' of Miz o ree."

Pomona is really far down south in the state. I am guessing a lot of the people who voted for Arkansas either have not ventured into all of the state's major cities and explored the whole state in detail. Regardless of what this survey says, there are many others out there that have proved to the contrary.

[cyrano]

If you ask me, Missouri is most similar to Alsace-Lorraine. Or Applesauce-Lorraine, as Rocky and Bullwinkle used to say. But I voted for Arkansas, just to be difficult.

And if you ask me, this is a rather inane topic, one that poses a question whose answer depends on which part of the elephant one happens to have hold of at any particular time.