Talk:Missouri

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[edit] St. Louis bias continued

I am adding on the page that Kansas City is Missouri's largest city. I will keep the urban areas thing, but most people don't care about "urban areas" they want to know WHAT CITY is the largest in the state. It seems to me it's another attempt at St. Louisians to try to "brag" about their city despite the fact that the municipality of Kansas City, Missouri is 100,000 people larger than the municipality of St. Louis, MO.

See the conversation below, and the archived ones, both Kansas City and St. Louis are mentioned in the infobox as largest city and metropolitan area, respectively. The use of urban area specifically instead of the words city or metropolitan area is the best compromise I can see being engineered between the two sides. Assuming you are enorton, which judging by your style grammer, and the arguments you have consistently raised, you are the only editor who has expressed such a aggressively KC point-of-view without bending or accepting the current compromise. Please don't change it again, unless a new consensus is reached here. A new consensus could happen, even if I think it's unlikely, but you have to give time for several editors to look at it.-Grey Wanderer | Talk 20:12, 12 May 2008 (UTC)


[edit] St. Louis bias again

There seems to be too much of a lean twoards St. Louis on this page. I am from Kansas City, and I am sick and tired of St. Louis people trying to dominate everything. It made me sick to see "St. Louis, the largest metro in the state" and then talk about the Louis and Clark expedition. First off, this is an article on MISSOURI not St. Louis. If you want to include that info fine, but do it in the STL article. Second of all, the largest "metro". Metro is a collection of cities. THere was no St. Louis metro when that expedition was launched. If you would have said "St. Louis, the SECOND largst city..." then mabye it would be different. St. Lousisans on here need to accept the fact that KC is a bigger city. Case closed. I have gotten into numerous debates about this and I grudgengly accept the "Largest metro" statistic in the infobox. But this crosses the line. I have deleted that little "St. Louis" bit from the introduction to missouri. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Enorton (talk • contribs) 21:40, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Having a hard time agreeing you, you've demonstrated a pretty heavy bias before and most editors seem to think that the page is pretty balanced. No one is out to attack Kansas City, we're here to write about it. Grey Wanderer | Talk 18:23, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

"The four largest URBAN AREAS ARE, in descending order, "St. Louis, MO", "Kansas City, MO",......". My question: Why are we even mentioning URBAN AREAS? Why are we not mentioning the largest cities or metropolitan areas. To me, this is just another way for St. Louians to try to tell the world how they are bigger than Kansas City. They really need to get over this. Kansas City has a larger population than St. Louis in terms of city propper. Stop underplaying this role. Many people feel that the city proper population is what counts and some feel it is the metro population. Again, it depends on the person. Stop trying to downplay KC's role as the largest city in Missouri. This is rediculous. I have erased this statistic, because Urban Area is a statistic that isn't even important or relavent. You may have an argument with the "metro area" statistic, however, that is still going to be controversial. How about we just write about our STATE not about how St. Louis is somehow (and I doubt the fact) the largest "urban" area in the state. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.26.28.84 (talk) 05:27, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Enorton, I was the one who wrote the intro to the Missouri page, which includes the section you think has spin. I weighed the options of using the United States census definitions of cities, metropolitan areas, or urban areas. Part of the reason I spent time determining which would be the best, most accurate definition to use was due to your claims of Saint Louis "propaganda" on this page. This is a list of options I weighed:

I concluded without difficulty that the urban area construct was the most accurate and useful. Wikipedia claims that " Urban areas are among the most accurate measure of a city's true size, due to the fact that they are all measured from the same criteria." Among the flaws of the other two definitions are that the words city and metropolitan area are of a much more ambiguous nature, and won't always be associated with U.S. census statistics.
I understand your love for Kansas City, I wrote the intro on the Kansas City page as well, but you keep claiming that I'm attacking KC or pushing St. Louis, neither of which I'm doing and you are the only editor that has made that assertion. Please discuss here before reverting again, and feel free to make suggestions to improve the article. Thanks. Grey Wanderer | Talk 20:15, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree with the determination of the largest metropolitan area. The only reason St. Louis City isn't the largest city is the break of the St. Louis County from the city a while back. Alatari (talk) 15:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Omission of Lincoln University

I am saddened to note that the article on Missouri failed to list Lincoln University among those mentioned in the Colleges and Universities, as Lincoln, a historically Black University sits in the middle of Jefferson City, the State's Capital.

It was founded in 1866 by members of the 62nd and 65th United States Colored Infantry under the name "Lincoln Institute" for the purpose of providing an education to African Americans through the combining of academics and labor. In 1921, it was officially designated a university by the state of Missouri and changed its name to "Lincoln University of Missouri." In 1954, it opened its doors to applicants of all races, and it currently provides both undergraduate and graduate courses. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.16.43.46 (talk) 14:35, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

I suspect it's admitted because it is as notable as dozens of other universities in Missouri and one we start listing one, it is a slippery slope and the article just becomes a list of universities in Missouri (which actually has it's own page). I feel that we should stick to universities that are ranked in educational journals. I could see a place for it listed with the other public schools, if you feel that way perhaps you should be bold and list it. Grey Wanderer | Talk 18:23, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Notable colleges

I used “America's Best Colleges 2008: National Universities: Top Schools.” USNews.com: . January 18, 2008. to help decide what is WP:N for Missouri schools to list. If it's in the top 100 it better be listed. Rolla has dropped heavily and I'm shocked. Alatari (talk) 15:45, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Good source Alatari, I've been watching that section for a while to make sure it doesn't become a list of universities in Missouri. I've always keep it pruned to those two private schools, albeit without a source, because I know they are highly ranked.-Grey Wanderer | Talk 16:10, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Missouri Portal

The Missouri Portal was recently created at Portal:Missouri. -Grey Wanderer | Talk 03:53, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

The portal now needs to become more populated with articles, this is largely a cut and paste job. If anyone needs help figuring it out let me know. Grey Wanderer | Talk 05:31, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Midwest or South?

Should Missouri just be listed as a "midwestern" state? I know "midwest" is a vague term similar to "middle class" where various groups claiming it. It's a term used to describe Ohio, Michigan, Indiana etc. as well as Kansas, Nebraska, Dakotas. It is my understanding depending on the county, different people in the state call themselves "southern" or "midwestern", probably a north vs. south thing. In any event Missouri fought (mostly) for the south in the civil war and borders AR and TN as well as IL. If it is labeled as midwestern there should at least be a qualification, imo66.72.215.225 (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 20:19, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, since we've had this discussion before, I *think* (skimming through) the consensus (if any) was for Midwestern, or possibly "Border" - but that most people didn't think of Missouri (any more, at least) as "Southern". Anyways, people who've been around longer feel free to correct me. Anyway, basically, what the previous discussion seemed to state was that St. Louis has the Northern/Eastern feel, the Bootheel has the Southern feel, KC is a Western town, and the rural areas seem to trend more towards the Midwestern agricultural feel. (If not already mentioned, I might suggest that the northwest corner may tend to the Great Plains agricultural model, but I couldn't back that up with any kind of scholarship, so...). --Umrguy42 (talk) 01:26, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
"If it is labeled as midwestern there should at least be a qualification, imo" - re-reading the archive more carefully, apparently the US Census Bureau (and CNN) classifies Missouri as "Midwestern". Not sure if that's the kind of "qualification" you were looking for, but that would at least be "official" sourcing for the term, anyway. Hope this helps. --Umrguy42 (talk) 01:26, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

The "Midwestern" label in the intro is expanded on in the geography section. As far as the civil war goes Wikipedia says: "By the end of the Civil War, Missouri had supplied nearly 110,000 troops for the Union Army and about 40,000 troops for the Confederate Army." Grey Wanderer | Talk 05:30, 29 May 2008 (UTC)