Today, the St Louis metropolitan area is home to nearly 3 million people. Manufacturing is important to the city's economy: its industries include cars, aerospace, food processing, brewing and medical and pharmaceutical research. Gateway Arch, the 630-foot-high (192-metre) stainless steel monument standing in the city on the banks of the Mississippi, symbolizes St Louis as the Gateway to the West.

Consultant: Nicholas Harris

History of Missouri

1000–1400
Mississippian culture: cities featuring massive earthwork mounds are built by the Native Americans in what is now Missouri

17th century
The area is inhabited by Native American Osage and Missouri peoples when French explorers Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet first travel down the Mississippi River

1682
Robert de La Salle claims the entire Mississippi Basin, including what is now Missouri state, for France, naming the territory Louisiana

1735
The first European settlement in Missouri is founded by French fur traders at present-day Sainte Genevieve; it becomes a thriving farming community, shipping tons of grain each year down the Mississippi River to Lower Louisiana for trade

1762
Control of the area of Louisiana west of the Mississippi is handed over to Spain by France

1764
St Louis is founded by French fur traders, Pierre Laclède and Auguste Chouteau; it becomes the centre of the fur trade with Native American tribes along the Missouri and Mississippi rivers

1800
Louisiana Territory (including the Missouri area) is regained by France under the Treaty of San Ildefonso

1803
Louisiana Purchase: Napoleon Bonaparte sells Louisiana to the US

1804
Missouri gains the nickname “Gateway to the West” because St Charles, just to the west of St Louis, serves as a major departure point for expeditions, such as the Lewis and Clark Expedition of that year, heading to the American West

1812
The Territory of Missouri, which includes much of the large area acquired in the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 (except the newly created Louisiana state in the south), is established

1810s–20s
Steamboats are first used on the Mississippi, enabling rice, timber and other goods to be transported by ship; St Louis expands rapidly as a port with this greatly increased river trade

early 19th century
Planters from the South arrive in Missouri, bringing with them enslaved African Americans as agricultural labourers. Plantations for growing hemp are established on the flatlands along the Missouri River, an area that becomes known as "Little Dixie"

1819
All of Missouri Territory south of the 36°30' parallel, except the Missouri Bootheel, becomes the new Territory of Arkansaw (later Arkansas)

1820
Missouri Compromise: Maine is admitted to the Union as a free state along with Missouri as a slave state, thus maintaining the balance of free states (in the North) and slave states (in the South). As part of the compromise, slavery is prohibited north of the 36°30' parallel, excluding Missouri

1826
State capital is established at Jefferson City

early 1830s
Mormon migrants begin settling near Independence, but conflicts over religion and slavery arise between them and the plantation owners, leading to the Mormon War of 1838; Mormons are expelled the following year

mid-19th century
German and Irish immigrants arrive and settle mainly in the St Louis area

1855–56
Tensions erupt into open warfare between pro-slavery and anti-slavery forces along the border between Missouri and Kansas

1861
Confederacy recognizes Missouri’s secession (breaking away) from the Union, even though the state government does not vote for it

1861–65
Civil War: fighting in the state consists chiefly of guerrilla warfare in which “citizen soldiers”, such as Frank and Jesse James, flourish as outlaws

1870s–90s
Kansas City becomes the rail centre of the West, and its population increases rapidly

1874
Eads Bridge, a combined road and railway bridge over the Mississippi River connecting the cities of St Louis, Missouri and East St Louis, Illinois, is completed. It is the first bridge across the Mississippi south of the confluence with the Missouri, and will later become the oldest bridge on the entire river

1904
St Louis hosts both the World’s Fair and the Summer Olympics

1910
Hallmark Cards, Inc., the oldest and largest manufacturer of greeting cards in the US, is founded in 1910 by the Hall brothers, Joyce ("J.C"), Rollie and William, in Kansas City, Missouri

1943
The George Washington Carver National Monument near Diamond, Missouri, becomes the first US National Monument dedicated to a non-President and the first for an African American. Carver was an agricultural scientist and inventor who developed methods to prevent soil depletion

1965
The Gateway Arch, a 192-m (630-ft) high monument in St Louis, the world's tallest arch, is completed. Built as a monument to the westward expansion of the US, it is officially dedicated to "the American people"

2014
Michael Brown Jr., an 18-year-old black man, is fatally shot by white police officer Darren Wilson in the city of Ferguson, Missouri, a suburb of St Louis. Witnesses claim Brown had his hands up in surrender and said "don't shoot". The shooting ignites unrest in Ferguson and the police are criticized for their response. The US Department of Justice later concludes that Wilson shot Brown in self-defence and he is not charged.