Missouri is located in the Midwest of the United States and was the starting point of many historic routes for settlers, traders and explorers to the West, including the Lewis and Clark Expedition that set out in 1804. In remembrance of the westward expansion, the Gateway Arch monument was erected in St. Louis. It is the tallest arch in the world. 

The state is named after the Missouri River, the longest river in the United States, which flows into the Mississippi River north of St. Louis. With the era of steamboats, the waterways became important transportation and travel links from the 1810s onwards. The Missouri River got its name from the Native American tribe of the Missouria. The term roughly means „people with wooden canoes“. In addition to the Missourians, the Osage inhabited the area at the time of European arrival. Ste. Genevieve was founded in 1735 by French Canadians as the first permanent European settlement in Missouri. The area became part of French Louisiana, which was ceded to Spain in 1762 due to the French defeat in the Seven Years' War. After Napoleon reacquired Louisiana in 1800 through the secret Third Treaty of San Ildefonso, he sold it to the U.S. in 1803. In 1812, the Louisiana Territory was renamed Missouri Territory and in 1821, Missouri became the 24^th state admitted to the Union. The state motto "Salus populi suprema lex esto" is Latin for "let the good of the people be the supreme law". 

Before the Prohibition, Missouri was the second-largest wine-producer in the United States. The wineries founded by German settlers in Missouri River Valley earned the region the name "Missouri Rhineland", after the wine-growing region on the Rhine river in Germany.

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