Joan Stack

The Missouri Department of Natural Resources acquired the Thomas Hart Benton Home and Studio State Historic Site site in 1977, two years after the death of the Neosho-born artist.

Byron Smith’s family has lived in Boone County near Columbia for generations, and his landscapes express not only the beauty of the local architecture and countryside, but also the artist’s strong ancestral connections.

You may not know the name, Fred Geary, but this Carroll County artist was a nationally important graphic designer in the first half of the twentieth century. He created an impressive body of fine-art woodcuts and wood engravings that are found in museums and libraries across the United States. 

I drive down a rural country road in Callaway County toward the home and studio of artist Jane Mudd. Jane lives with her husband Tom in a log home deep in the woods, about seven miles from Fulton. I turn up the driveway to the Mudd’s home and notice that the recent rain has left the countryside lush and beautiful. “You caught us dancing!” Jane laughs as I approach, stepping into their outdoor room with a million-dollar view of a verdant valley surrounded by Callaway County’s wooded hills.

Missouri art lovers may know Doug as the former director of the Daum Museum of Contemporary Art in Sedalia. Doug helped found this extraordinary museum, where visitors may be surprised to find world-class works by artists such as Helen Frankenthaler, Richard Diebenkorn, and Robert Motherwell. Doug was a close friend of the museum’s namesake, Dr. Harold F. Daum, who had amassed an impressive art collection over the course of many years. Harold asked Doug to help plan a museum founded on this collection, and the artist oversaw its development from 1999 until its opening in 2002.

The Enigmatic Kate Tracy Monument in Boonville’s Walnut Grove Cemetery