Place names of six east central counties of Missouri

Abstract

Counties: Audrain, Monroe, Montgomery, Pike, Ralls, and Randolph.

Graduate students in the English Department of the State University under the supervision of Dr. Robert L. Ramsay have treated, to date, fifty-four counties in six master's theses (see Bibliography). The six counties included in this work make a total of sixty, or over half the counties of the state. It is hoped that in a few more years the entire state will be covered, for much valuable information is being lost through the death of old residents, the best source of information. The counties studied in this thesis -- Audrain, Monroe, Montgomery, Pike, Ralls, and Randolph -- lie north of the Missouri River and extend eastward from the central part of the state to the Mississippi River. They are bound together, with the exception of Montgomery County, by Salt River, a tributary of the Mississippi River, and its several large forks. Montgomery County is drained by Loutre River, the stream next in size, which lies in the neighborhood, but does not unite with Salt River because of the "divide". This "divide" crosses northern Montgomery County and central Audrain and Randolph Counties.... In making a study of the place-names of the six counties, my method of procedure has not varied from that used by former students in the field. I have included all the names found on maps, atlases, plat books, and other county records and in gazetteers, business directories, postal guides, and histories. After I had exhausted all available library material, both for lists of names and their solutions, I went into the field, where I interviewed old residents and other well-informed citizens of the county, verifying old material and collecting new."--Pages 4-5, 7-8.