Missouri...Southern or Midwestern? (Springfield, Joplin: tobacco, diversity, better)

[GunnerTHB]

Originally Posted by onegoalstl

As I posted before, in Southeast Missouri businesses use the term "South" or "Midsouth" in their names more compared to "Central" or "midwest" in their names like St. Louis uses. I also noticed in the rest of Missouri near, along, and south of highway 60 some business have "southern" in their names, and some have "Dixie" as part of their names as well.

Why does it seem in the Ozarks part just north of hwy 60 seems to be the dividing line for Dixie and upland south? lets say within 40- 50 miles of the AR border which is what many parts of hwy 60 are within. Why is it such a dividing line. What would cause a road to be it? Some parts just north of it too like Springfield also. I see hwy 60 used a lot by KSHE especially as the general dividing line for dixie in many parts of MO.

The hwy 60 thing does have merit as whenever being around there it does have a different feel when your in southern MO and takes on more dixie than the rest of the areas.

Seems Springfield MO has a numbert of businesses with "South" in it based on looking at phonebook listings.

I was wondering why don't you see the term Midsouth used for central, northwest Arkansas, and southern Missouri Ozarks?

It seems Northwest Arkansas, NE OK, and SW MO up to Joplin is like Nomans land. No one really knows how to classify it. Kinda like parts of Texas in a way too that people can't figure if its western, or southern.

The term "Mid-South" is related to the Memphis area. That is why that prefix is usually restricted to the Southeast part of the state of Missouri.

[onegoalstl]

Originally Posted by GunnerTHB

The term "Mid-South" is related to the Memphis area. That is why that prefix is usually restricted to the Southeast part of the state of Missouri.

Well the southern part of the bootheel is just an hours drive at the most from the MS state line which MS is a deep south state!

Would you consider the bootheel, and I mean the southern most three bootheel counties of New madrid, Pemiscott, and Dunklin counties to be more southern than Kentucky which is a upland south state?

[GunnerTHB]

Originally Posted by onegoalstl

Well the southern part of the bootheel is just an hours drive at the most from the MS state line which MS is a deep south state!

Would you consider the bootheel, and I mean the southern most three bootheel counties of New madrid, Pemiscott, and Dunklin counties to be more southern than Kentucky which is a upland south state?

Probably...but Western KY & the Bootheel aren't a whole lot different really culturally. I can speak from experience that Western Kentucky is more southern than probably 80% of Missouri, even in Paducah which is dang near on the Ohio River.

Missouri is a great state because of all of the regional diversity we have and the bootheel is a great example. So are the Ozarks, the big two metro areas, and small towns that dot the northern half of the state as well. Even county to county is different.

For example, I cannot think of a single Catholic Church in Cape Girardeau County outside the city limits of either Cape or Jackson (There may be one or two but like I said I can't think of any), but if you go any direction from Cape County (Other than Alexander Co. Illinois) you will have many Catholic churches in the rural areas. As far as I know, this has to do with immigration patterns. It's a very neat and interesting thing to observe, however.

[onegoalstl]

Originally Posted by GunnerTHB

Probably...but Western KY & the Bootheel aren't a whole lot different really culturally. I can speak from experience that Western Kentucky is more southern than probably 80% of Missouri, even in Paducah which is dang near on the Ohio River.

Missouri is a great state because of all of the regional diversity we have and the bootheel is a great example. So are the Ozarks, the big two metro areas, and small towns that dot the northern half of the state as well. Even county to county is different.

For example, I cannot think of a single Catholic Church in Cape Girardeau County outside the city limits of either Cape or Jackson (There may be one or two but like I said I can't think of any), but if you go any direction from Cape County (Other than Alexander Co. Illinois) you will have many Catholic churches in the rural areas. As far as I know, this has to do with immigration patterns. It's a very neat and interesting thing to observe, however.

I've been in Paducah before and a lot of them have a thick accent, but it did not sound like the Missouri bootheel, Mississippi delta style accent down there. Some of those people in the bootheel it's hard to understand what they're saying.

Like you said Paducah southern than 80% of Mo which would make sense the 20% being SE MO bootheel.

Paducah didn't give me the delta, deep southish feeling the bootheel delta region gives. Doesn't have the King Cotton feel.

[onegoalstl]

You also have Bollinger County West of Cape that is heavily Southern Baptist and Protestant. 52 pecent Baptist, and 12 percent protestant.

Bollinger County, Missouri - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[GunnerTHB]

Originally Posted by onegoalstl

You also have Bollinger County West of Cape that is heavily Southern Baptist and Protestant. 52 pecent Baptist, and 12 percent protestant.

Bollinger County, Missouri - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Like I said, it differs from Cape County where there are no Catholic churches in the rural areas.

[onegoalstl]

Originally Posted by GunnerTHB

Like I said, it differs from Cape County where there are no Catholic churches in the rural areas.

That's odd there isn't any Catholic churches in the rural areas? Usually there are still a few. Hmm.

[OwenFam]

Originally Posted by GraniteStater

Southern MO certainly has very little in common with the Midwest. When outsiders think of Missouri they think St. Louis or KC which are mostly Midwest. In terms of rural areas, very few people live in the Midwest parts of MO (central and northern ) while far more live in the southern areas of MO that aren't really Midwest. I gurantee that few people from Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, etc would consider southern MO the Midwest. That is due to landuse, landcover, ancestry, religious, and income differences as mentioned before.

I was just saying that I have never heard of MO being referred to as anything but the midwest. I thought maybe there is something that I was missin' about living here all my life so I asked a few of my out-of-state friends. I asked friends (on my Facebook account) from Texas, New York, Georgia, Michigan, PA, Florida, Colorado, Iowa, and Indiana what they think and they all teased me because they said that MO is only known as the midwest. So I guess I am not completely out-of-the-loop like I was starting to think I was. And, yes, I did specify what part of MO that I live in and they all said, didn't matter....MO is midwest no matter what area.

[GunnerTHB]

Originally Posted by OwenFam

I was just saying that I have never heard of MO being referred to as anything but the midwest. I thought maybe there is something that I was missin' about living here all my life so I asked a few of my out-of-state friends. I asked friends (on my Facebook account) from Texas, New York, Georgia, Michigan, PA, Florida, Colorado, Iowa, and Indiana what they think and they all teased me because they said that MO is only known as the midwest. So I guess I am not completely out-of-the-loop like I was starting to think I was. And, yes, I did specify what part of MO that I live in and they all said, didn't matter....MO is midwest no matter what area.

LOL! Tell that to the farmers in Dunklin County who farm over 160,000 acres of Cotton. Dunklin County has often been cited as the highest cotton producing county in the nation. Another example of out of staters thinkin they know what Missouri is and isn't.

I didn't know that Cotton & Rice were midwestern crops.

[OwenFam]

Originally Posted by GunnerTHB

LOL! Tell that to the farmers in Dunklin County who farm over 160,000 acres of Cotton. Another example of out of staters thinkin they know what Missouri is and isn't.

I didn't know that Cotton & Rice were midwestern crops.

A cotton crop (or any other "southern inspired" activity) does not make locale....