The Show Me State

Who can name "The Show Me State"?




It's Missouri!!

Why you ask?
I'll tell you.

I was driving along today listening to Sara Evans on my mp3 player. She was singing a song called "Missing Missouri." The chorus goes:

I'm caught up in missing Missouri

Cause I wanna be with my family
Instead of stuck out on this road I'm on
Everytime my bus wheels hit the bootheel
There's no limelight and I'm alright
'Cause I'm almost home
Where they love me,
where they know me

Where they show me

back in Missouri

And I was a bit curious as to what she meant when she said "where they show me." Of course I didn't give it too much thought at the time. But then later in the day, a car drove by with Missouri plates:

It then connected with me as to why Sara Evans says Missouri is "where they show me."


SHOW ME WHAT???


So I text messaged my good friend Travis who lives in St. Louis. Travis is usually full of knowledge, useful and otherwise, so I thought he might know.
This is Travis and I in the Angeles Crest National Forest after bungee jumping in LA:


But, alas, Travis did not know why Missouri is the Show-Me State. I thought this was unsatisfactory. A Missourian ought to be able to tell you why their state is what it is, like I can tell you why Texas is THE LONE STAR STATE and why California is The Golden State.

He suggested that I look it up and then blog about it. So that's what I am doing!


And here is the answer taken straight from Wikipedia:


The phrase "I'm from Missouri" means I'm skeptical of the matter and not easily convinced. This is related to the state's motto of "Show Me," whose origin is popularly ascribed to an 1899 speech by Congressman Willard Vandiver, who declared that "I come from a country that raises corn and cotton, cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I'm from Missouri, and you have got to show me." However, according to researchers, the phrase was in circulation earlier in the 1890s. According to another story, the phrase was originally a reference to Missouri laborers being brought to Colorado to quell a miner's strike and requiring frequent instruction.

So as it turns out, the answer is not all that exciting. But if I am ever talking to a native Missourian, I'll know not to be impatient if they don't understand what I'm trying to explain; I'll just have to figure out a way to show them.

And in case that wasn't interesting enough to you, Missouri is also home of the world's largest pecan. Here I'll show you:

Signing off,

RBB