National Missouri Day

Parks and Historical Sites

• Kaiser:

  Lake of the Ozarks State Park

• Arrow Rock:

  Arrow Rock State Historic Site

• Diamond:

  George Washington Carver National Monument

• Independence & Grandview:

  Harry S Truman National Historic Site

• Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail

Museums

• St. Louis:

  Missouri History Museum

• Jefferson City:

  Missouri State Museum

• Kansas City:

  National World War I Museum and Memorial

• Kansas City:

  Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art

• St. Louis:

  Missouri Civil War Museum

• Saint Joseph:

  Pony Express Museum

• Kansas City:

  Negro Leagues Baseball Museum

• Hannibal:

  Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum

• Camdenton:

  Ha Ha Tonka Castle Ruins

• St. Louis:

  Grant's Farm

• Iron Township:

  Elephant Rocks State Park

• Joplin:

  National Cookie Cutter Historical Museum

• Samuel Clemens - The author of two American classics, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Clemens wrote under the pen name Mark Twain. From journalistic pursuits, and travel writing to puzzling over the human condition, humorous and satirical, short stories and dabbling in science fiction, Mark Twain covered a broad swath of shelf space.

• Martha Jane Canary - Orphaned at a young age, Martha Jane Canary grew up to be known as the legendary sharpshooter, Calamity Jane. She earned a notorious reputation in the Wild West of Deadwood, South Dakota, for her relationships with wanted men including Wild Bill Hickok, drunkenness and general lawlessness. Most of the stories surrounding her life are unverifiable.

  Later in her life, Canary would perform in Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show in 1893 and in the 1901 Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York.

• General John J. Pershing - Tapped by President Woodrow Wilson to lead the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) in Europe during World War I, General John J. Pershing's reputation for leading men was noticed soon after his graduation from West Point in 1877. Pershing endured tragedy in 1913 when his wife and three daughters perished in a fire. His only son survived.

  Pershing pursued Pancho Villa on the orders of President Wilson after the Mexican revolutionary's killing rampage through New Mexico. Pershing never caught Villa, but Europe was calling, and he was needed.

• George Washington Carver - Known as "the Peanut Man" for his groundbreaking research in the field of peanuts and other crops, George Washington Carver paved the way for struggling farmers to make a living in new markets. During his time as the head of the agricultural department of Tuskegee Institute, Carver developed numerous products from peanuts making the once unfarmable legume a valuable commodity.

• Nellie Tayloe Ross - In 1924, the Wyoming Democratic Party nominated Nellie Tayloe Ross for governor before she had given them her decision to run. Her husband, the former governor, had passed away in October. At election time, Ross became the first woman governor in the United States. The newly elected governor carried out her husband's unfinished business, but she had business to conduct of her own. She focused on women's issues and child labor, schools funding and job safety among other regulations.

  Governor Ross ran for a second term and the race was fierce and close. However, she lost by a narrow margin of 1,365 of approximately 70,000 votes.

• George Coleman Poage - A graduate of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, George Coleman Poage was the first African American to win an Olympic medal. He earned a bronze medal in the 400-meter hurdles in the 1904 games held at St. Louis.

• Harry S. Truman - Harry S. Truman took office after the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1945. Within a few months, the war in Germany ended, atomic bombs ended the war in Japan, and the Cold War began. In 1948, Truman famously defeated Thomas Dewey by a narrow margin for reelection. He set out to create social reform with his New Deal and supported the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

• T.S. Eliot - The author of poetic works such as The Waste Land (1922) and dramas like Murder in the Cathedral (1935), T.S. Eliot broadened his influence in the literary world through the publication of his journal the Criterion. In 1948, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature.

• August Anheuser Busch, Jr. - The heir to the Busch empire, August Anheuser Busch, Jr. started in the family business cleaning vats. After his father's death in 1946, Busch became president of the company. In 1953, the brewery purchased the St. Louis Cardinals at the urging of Busch, and the two franchises have been entwined ever since.

• Martha Gellhorn - Martha Gellhorn traveled around the world as a war correspondent for more than a half century. She reported on conflicts from the Spanish Civil War (1936-39) to the invasion of Panama in 1990.

• Maya Angelou - Poet laureate Maya Angelou is recognized for poetry and her memoir Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. She earned numerous awards including the Presidential Medal of Freedom and three Grammy Awards for Best Spoken Word Album. Among her many other talents, the best selling author was also a screenwriter and civil rights activist.

• Steven Chu - A 1997 recipient of the Nobel Prize for Physics, Steven Chu served in President Obama's administration as Secretary of Energy from January 21, 2009 to April 22, 2013.

• Jack Dorsey - Technology developer and businessman, Jack Dorsey, co-founded the social media platform Twitter with Evan Williams, Biz Stone and Noah Glass, in 2006. Evans also co-founded the online payment company, Square, in 2009.