Missouri Bootheel

Poplar Bluff Regional sits just above the Bootheel and for the last few years has been running a nurse externship program where student nurses get hands on experience working in the hospital. Ashlee Dunn oversees the program. She grew up in nearby Bollinger County and spoke about the benefits of training nurses from the community — in the community.

Laveta Lockridge and Job Green work at the Lincoln University Extension office in Caruthersville. This year, they started a community garden as a way to educate folks on nutrition, as well as provide them with free, fresh produce in an area where that can be hard to get.

Sophie Freeman is a queer woman who grew up in a “very small, rural, conservative town” in the Missouri Bootheel. She spoke about exploring her sexuality during the COVID-19 pandemic and unlearning harmful LGBTQ+ stereotypes.

Reports for three school districts in southeast Missouri indicate most school buildings aren't earthquake-resistant. Some districts are doing more than others to fix that.

The Stars and Stripes Museum and Library, in Bloomfield, Missouri, hosts an annual summer journalism camp for kids. This year the students took over Missouri School of Journalism microphones to interview each other about their families, their lives, and their hopes and dreams.

The Magnitude 7 Metals plant employed more than 400 workers in Marston.

Poplar Bluff, Missouri, is located deep in the southeastern part of the state, in the area known as the Bootheel. One resident joked to me that if…

Lee Ann Stuart still wears her nursing scrubs, even though the only work she’s been doing since Twin Rivers Regional Medical Center closed June 11 is to...

Taja Welton is ready for her daughter to be born. She’s moved into a bigger house, one with room for a nursery. She has a closet full of pink, Minnie...

Cotton fabric has been a staple in our closets for decades, but times are tough for farmers in the U.S. cotton belt who are caught in the middle of a…