Alexander McNair soundly won election as Missouri’s first governor on this date in 1820. He earned 72 percent of the vote over the runner up, William Clark of the Lewis and Clark expedition. 

Based upon content from the book Missouri 365: This Day in Missouri History by John W. Brown, broadcaster and Missouri historian. Get your copy at Reedy Press.

Photo credit: Highsmith, Carol M, photographer. Statue of the American explorers Meriwether Lewis in hat and William Clark outside the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center in Sioux City, Iowa. Woodbury County United States Iowa Sioux City, 2016. -08-04. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2016630142/.