Missouri Fun Facts
Information About Missouri, Missouri Geography, and Missouri Schools

Missouri is unofficially referred to as "The Show Me State." Missouri's state song is "Missouri Waltz."

The abbreviation for Missouri is MO. Jefferson City is the capital of Missouri, and Kansas City is the largest city. Residents of Missouri are referred to as Missourians.

The state bird of Missouri is the bluebird. The White Hawthorn is the state flower and the Flowering Dogwood is the state tree.

Missouri gets its name from a tribe of Sioux Indians of the state called the Missouris. The word " Missouri" often has been construed to mean "muddy water," but the Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology has stated it means "town of the large canoes," and authorities have said the Indian syllables from which the word comes mean "wooden canoe people" or "he of the big canoe."

Missouri was ranked 16th in population within the United States and received its statehood August 19, 1821.

Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Tennessee are all bordering states of Missouri. The Mississippi River and the Missouri River are both bodies of water in Missouri.

Missouri has a major corn and soybean farming industry. Mining zinc and lead are also major industries of Missouri.

There were 900,517 K12 students in the Missouri public schools in 1996. Out of those students 70,875 were first grade students. There were also 59,428 K12 public school teachers in the Missouri public schools system. There were a total of 2,291 Missouri public schools in 1996. (Source: IES National Center for Education Statistics)