Pendersleigh & Sons' Official Map of Missouri

In my experience, when you'ins tell people you’re from Missouri, most people reply self-satisfiedly with "don't you mean Missouruh?" or "where is Missouri? I don’t think I’ve ever been there." Whether Missouri is Midwestern or Southern is a common conversation amongst Missourians... at least on the internet. In my experience, Missouri's Midwestern neighbors (haters) usually disparage it as a hick state whurr test scores are low, the accent is ugly and you'ins can buy fireworks, liquor and ammo... all in the same place. Missouri's Southern neighbors (haters) usually don't consider it to be Southern because Missouri didn't side with the South in the Civil War (well, that's complicated-- thurr were 30,000 gray and 109,000 blue) and because South Coasters love to disassociate themselves from the Upland South. Mark Twain, Langston Hughes, Thomas Hart Benton all seem fairly Southern, no? And T.S. Elliot, William Burroughs and Maya Angelou don’t so much, right? Cultural cringe I reckon.

a feller with a Missouri hummingbird