What is "The South?"

[Sctvhound]

My definition of the South. Morgantown and Fairmont, WV are most assuredly not. Morgantown is 65 miles from Pittsburgh.

https://twitter.com/sctvman/status/1599568651417313280?s=61&t=JHS3bz_lu770G99Li3ixlQ

[SEWIGuy]

I'm sorry, but NO part of ANY state NORTH of the Ohio River is in any way part of "The South". Yes, there are certainly southern INFLUENCES in parts of southern Illinois, southern Indiana, and southern Ohio, but to try and assert that any part of those three states is "The South" s just plain ignorant, IMO.

Furthermore, no state that was NOT part of the original Northwest Territory of the USA (Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, and parts of Minnesota) can be considered to be in "The Midwest" or Midwestern. The Mississippi and Ohio Rivers are the diving lines there (except in northern Minnesota). So sorry Iowa, Missouri, and Kentucky (and Great Plains states like the rest of Minnesota, the Dakotas, Kansas, and Nebraska) but you're not part of our region. All or parts of those states may have quite strong "Midwestern influences", but they are NOT a part of "The Midwest".

Feel free to disagree, if you feel you must do so.

Any definition of "midwest" that doesn't include Iowa is a poor definition.

[Roadgeekteen]

Illinois is midwestern. So is Indiana. And most of Ohio.

What part of Ohio is not midwestern?

[Rothman]

Illinois is midwestern. So is Indiana. And most of Ohio.

What part of Ohio is not midwestern?

The coal country part.

[Hot Rod Hootenanny]

Illinois is midwestern. So is Indiana. And most of Ohio.

What part of Ohio is not midwestern?

The part that hasn't been covered in a roadmeet.

[Road Hog]

Illinois is midwestern technically geographically, but much of the state was developed by the southerners. A lot of southern influence running around. Williamson County was basically for a time being run by Seth Glenn Young and a lot of Klansmen.

What all this arguing reminds you is that all this is subjective to the person. Doesn't seem worth wasting the energy.

A less controversial example might be Lincoln who settled in Illinois by way of Central Kentucky.

An alternate alternate take is Lincoln got out of slave territory while the getting was good.

[elsmere241]

Illinois is midwestern technically geographically, but much of the state was developed by the southerners. A lot of southern influence running around. Williamson County was basically for a time being run by Seth Glenn Young and a lot of Klansmen.

What all this arguing reminds you is that all this is subjective to the person. Doesn't seem worth wasting the energy.

A less controversial example might be Lincoln who settled in Illinois by way of Central Kentucky.

An alternate alternate take is Lincoln got out of slave territory while the getting was good.

He wasn't that old when the family moved from Kentucky to Indiana, and from what I understand, a lot of Kentuckians were moving north because they were having a hard time establishing title to their land.  (Kentucky is not in the Public Lands Surveys the way Indiana and Illinois are.)  Slavery didn't have that much to do with it.

[MikieTimT]

Hell, if someone said parts of Oklahoma were Midwestern, I'd at least hear their argument for it. Kay County doesn't look too different from Illinois.

Anywhere in Oklahoma north of I-40 and east of US 281 or so absolutely can make a claim for Midwestern. As I've mentioned on here before, Tulsa reminds me way more of Omaha or Kansas City than it does of Texas or anything in the South.  Oklahoma City does have a little more of that Texas feel, but even then, Dallas is really more Midwestern than anything else...

The cities tend to trend more midwestern in this part of the country, including NWA, but once you get into the rural (not suburban) parts, it's a different world, with lifestyles not too removed from 60 years ago.  The cities of NWA actually have historically been better connected to Tulsa and KC than Little Rock due to the Boston Mountains being a fairly big impediment to travel before US-71 was replaced with I-540/I-49, and now with all of the transplants moving into the area, it's even more the case.  Even the weather up in this part of the state is closer to midwestern climate with milder summer and harsher winter than the rest of the state.

[kphoger]

So sorry Iowa, Missouri, and Kentucky (and Great Plains states like the rest of Minnesota, the Dakotas, Kansas, and Nebraska) but you're not part of our region. All or parts of those states may have quite strong "Midwestern influences", but they are NOT a part of "The Midwest".

It's not "your region".  It's ours too.

Hell, if someone said parts of Oklahoma were Midwestern, I'd at least hear their argument for it. Kay County doesn't look too different from Illinois.

Parts of Oklahoma are totally Midwestern.  And yeah, your mention of Kay County is spot on;  that's the part of the state I have in mind.

https://goo.gl/maps/3w9iKLEDa9Srmp226

[skluth]

Illinois is midwestern technically geographically, but much of the state was developed by the southerners. A lot of southern influence running around. Williamson County was basically for a time being run by Seth Glenn Young and a lot of Klansmen.

What all this arguing reminds you is that all this is subjective to the person. Doesn't seem worth wasting the energy.

A less controversial example might be Lincoln who settled in Illinois by way of Central Kentucky.

An alternate alternate take is Lincoln got out of slave territory while the getting was good.

He wasn't that old when the family moved from Kentucky to Indiana, and from what I understand, a lot of Kentuckians were moving north because they were having a hard time establishing title to their land.  (Kentucky is not in the Public Lands Surveys the way Indiana and Illinois are.)  Slavery didn't have that much to do with it.

While Lincoln and other Kentuckians were out of slave territory, southern Indiana and southern Illinois were settled by Southerners early on as they moved west from Kentucky and the generations before that from Virginia (including Lincoln's own family). They continued to move further west to Missouri and Kansas; Missouri came into the Union as a slave state and was quite Southern in character as far north as Hannibal (most of us are at least familiar with Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer) while the battle for Kansas before the Civil War can be found in most textbooks (unless Texas has scrubbed that from history texts too). The historic conflict is the settlement of Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio from both slave and free states and Northerners (and a lot of immigrants) settled the northern parts of last three because Canada was directly west from NY and New England so Americans from those regions had to migrate southwest. The completion of the Erie Canal in the mid-1820s was a huge factor in making it easy to migrate from New England to the Great Lakes region. The higher productivity of the extremely flat and fertile northern parts of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois (thanks to Ice Age glaciation) assured that north of the National Road (future US 40) would be the most populous areas and the cities along and north of the I-70 line dominated those states well into the 20th century. The rapid industrialization and massive European immigration of the Great Lakes cities at previous turn of the century assured that northern dominance continued.

I did like that map I posted earlier because - as others have also said - there's really a difference between what most think of as the True South™ and what's closer to Appalachia (which in my mind extends to the hills of Eastern Oklahoma). Appalachia has a lot of Southern mentality but tends to be a lot whiter as the land wasn't suited for plantation agriculture and IMO extends from Morgantown WV down the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys then to about Ardmore OK. Not sure of the exact split between the South and Appalachia, but there's a huge Southern dent into Appalachia up to the Bootheel. I agree it doesn't go as far west as West Texas and New Mexico. I'd have added another region called "The Great Plains" east of the Rockies, extending from the Prairie Provinces down to the Permian Basin and the Texas Hill Country north and northwest of Austin because it's culturally much the same with a lot of wheat fields and oil. I'd also have a separate region for the Bos-Wash megalopolis.

[TheHighwayMan3561]

So sorry Iowa, Missouri, and Kentucky (and Great Plains states like the rest of Minnesota, the Dakotas, Kansas, and Nebraska) but you're not part of our region. All or parts of those states may have quite strong "Midwestern influences", but they are NOT a part of "The Midwest".

It's not "your region".  It's ours too.

As a Minnesotan, I feel I have much more in common with the Dakotas and Iowa than I do with Indiana. Sorry SSR_317.

[webny99]

So sorry Iowa, Missouri, and Kentucky (and Great Plains states like the rest of Minnesota, the Dakotas, Kansas, and Nebraska) but you're not part of our region. All or parts of those states may have quite strong "Midwestern influences", but they are NOT a part of "The Midwest".

It's not "your region".  It's ours too.

As a Minnesotan, I feel I have much more in common with the Dakotas and Iowa than I do with Indiana. Sorry SSR_317.

Can't the both Great Lakes and Great Plains be part of the Midwest?

[kphoger]

The idea that Illinois and Iowa are in different regions of the country is completely foreign to me (and Illinois is one of the only two states I've lived in).

[SEWIGuy]

The idea that Illinois and Iowa are in different regions of the country is completely foreign to me (and Illinois is one of the only two states I've lived in).

Right. What I don't understand is, what region could Iowa possibly be in if not the midwest?

[Roadgeekteen]

So sorry Iowa, Missouri, and Kentucky (and Great Plains states like the rest of Minnesota, the Dakotas, Kansas, and Nebraska) but you're not part of our region. All or parts of those states may have quite strong "Midwestern influences", but they are NOT a part of "The Midwest".

It's not "your region".  It's ours too.

As a Minnesotan, I feel I have much more in common with the Dakotas and Iowa than I do with Indiana. Sorry SSR_317.

Minnesota, Iowa, and Indiana are all midwestern. The Dakotas are plains states but also midwestern. You gotta draw the line somwhere. Western Kansas is more similar to Eastern Colorado than Cleveland but Colorado is a mountain state and Kansas is midwestern.

[kphoger]

Minnesota, Iowa, and Indiana are all midwestern. The Dakotas are plains states but also midwestern. You gotta draw the line somwhere. Western Kansas is more similar to Eastern Colorado than Cleveland but Colorado is a mountain state and Kansas is midwestern.

This is why I think the Midwest ends just barely over the Colorado state line.  It's the Dakotas and Montana that I have trouble with:  where to draw the line?

But that's another thread.  This one is supposed to be about the South.

[webny99]

It's the Dakotas and Montana that I have trouble with:  where to draw the line?

I would use the line that's already there, the one between them. 

But that's another thread.  This one is supposed to be about the South.

That train may have left the station...

[Roadgeekteen]

Minnesota, Iowa, and Indiana are all midwestern. The Dakotas are plains states but also midwestern. You gotta draw the line somwhere. Western Kansas is more similar to Eastern Colorado than Cleveland but Colorado is a mountain state and Kansas is midwestern.

This is why I think the Midwest ends just barely over the Colorado state line.  It's the Dakotas and Montana that I have trouble with:  where to draw the line?

But that's another thread.  This one is supposed to be about the South.

The Midwest seems to be a very big region. Using some definitions, it stretches from Colorado to Upstate New York.

[J N Winkler]

This is why I think the Midwest ends just barely over the Colorado state line.  It's the Dakotas and Montana that I have trouble with:  where to draw the line?

That's easy--both Dakotas are Midwestern while Montana is part of the intermountain West.

[kphoger]

This is why I think the Midwest ends just barely over the Colorado state line.  It's the Dakotas and Montana that I have trouble with:  where to draw the line?

That's easy--both Dakotas are Midwestern while Montana is part of the intermountain West.

But that ignores the vast plains of eastern Montana, which appear to have a lot more in common with the Dakotas than with the Rockies.

[Scott5114]

I will say that I normally note enough of a shift in geography at US-81 that I would be fine saying it is midwest to the east of it and something else (High Plains?) to the west of it.

[webny99]

This is why I think the Midwest ends just barely over the Colorado state line.  It's the Dakotas and Montana that I have trouble with:  where to draw the line?

That's easy--both Dakotas are Midwestern while Montana is part of the intermountain West.

But that ignores the vast plains of eastern Montana, which appear to have a lot more in common with the Dakotas than with the Rockies.

Is that any different than eastern Colorado, though? Most of the population centers in Montana are also further west, while the eastern portions are quite sparsely populated.

[J N Winkler]

I will say that I normally note enough of a shift in geography at US-81 that I would be fine saying it is midwest to the east of it and something else (High Plains?) to the west of it.

Others suggest US 281 and US 83 as dividing lines.  It's possible to make cases one way or another based on prevalence of drip irrigation (favors US 281), upland Southern accents (favors US 81), etc.  The key is that it is a zone of gradual transition.

But that ignores the vast plains of eastern Montana, which appear to have a lot more in common with the Dakotas than with the Rockies.

Not at all.  If you are going by whole states rather than regions thereof, it makes no sense to put the mountain communities of central and western Montana (which have the bulk of the state population) in a Midwestern bloc.

[kphoger]

If you are going by whole states rather than regions thereof

I don't.

[kphoger]

Is that any different than eastern Colorado, though? Most of the population centers in Montana are also further west, while the eastern portions are quite sparsely populated.

As I said in the thread that's actually about the Midwest:

I also struggle with where to draw the line between Fargo, ND (obviously the Midwest) and Glacier National Park, MT (obviously not).

For example, consider how similar it is between these two roadscapes:
Chester, MT (300+ miles west of the ND/MT state line)
Dupree, SD (100+ miles east of the SD/MT state line)