Homestead mailing list

[VAN DELL JORDAN <vdjor AT yahoo.com>]

--- On Thu, 12/4/08, EarthNSky <erthnsky AT bellsouth.net> wrote:


> I know that those of who live in southern Missouri like to
> dissociate
> yourselves with the rest of the South, but I've been
> there a few times,
> from Branson to Springfield to Ava to West Plains to Joplin
> to New
> Madrid and other places, and I would say that southern
> Missouri is
> definitely 'The South'.  In parts more north, up
> around the midstate,
> from the STL suburbs to Columbia, KC and that area---,
> I'd call that
> more midwestern, like central Ill or Iowa.
> 

Traditionally Missouri was "upside down".  With the north being more southern 
and the south being.. independent.

I am in "little dixie", in the north central part of the state.  The settlers 
came from the south,  my ancestors from NC in the 1830s.  Some had slaves and 
many were southern sympathizers.  I believe the designation Little Dixie, 
came about after the war when this area voted as solid democratic as any part 
of the south. The most accepted definition Hannibal to Boonville, though some 
include larger areas of Northern Missouri.

The Ozarks did not seem to have that influence, I guess because the tar rain 
was best suited to subsistence farming.  I think more of the settlers there 
come from the appalachian mountains where there was less southern influence.  
I think this same attitude is what caused West Virginia to be split away from 
Virginia.

When reading articles that define the country by regions no one ever seems to 
agree where Mo should be placed.  South, midwest, northwest, central south, 
even great plains.  These are unnoficial defined by the authors.  Might be 
interesting to see how much that happens with other states?

Van Dell