That's a lot of courthouses: Missouri has more counties than many other states combined

There are few states where a driver can traverse the length of three — sometimes four — counties in as little as an hour.

Missouri is one of them.

The Show-Me State has 114 counties, the fifth-most among U.S. states, nearly doubling that of California (59), the most populous and third-largest.

But modern population (Missouri ranks 19th at roughly 6.2 million people) and land mass (Missouri is No. 21 at 68,727 square miles) have very little to do with the number of counties in Missouri, each providing one of the oldest units of government to their respective areas. 

Missouri's large number of counties — each administering and enforcing state laws, collecting taxes, schools, assessing property, records public documents, conduct elections, issues licenses, and more — is a product mass growth toward the west as the nation was being formed.

There are myriad reasons and more convoluted explanations for their respective origins, which began in 1812, nine years before Missouri became the country's 24th state.

"People didn't want to be more than a day's trip away on horseback for those services," said Steve Hobbs, executive director of the Missouri Association of Counties.

From the macro of Springfield's Greene County (estimated 306,000 residents) to the micro of nearby Buffalo's Dallas County (estimated 17,500 residents), the services are similar, even if their communities' identities, traditions and commercial offerings provide stark contrast.

Sheriffs? 114 of them. Stately courthouses? 114. County coroners? 114.

At an annual Missouri Association of Counties conference in November, Hobbs said hundreds of representatives from their respective subdivisions make the trek to Jefferson City, eager to represent the unique qualities of their home counties.

"Many of our counties are as diverse as Missouri is diverse as a state," Hobbs said.

How did these counties form?

Before it was a state and still known as the Missouri Territory, five counties bordering the Mississippi River were formed in 1812 following the Louisiana Purchase: Cape Girardeau, New Madrid, Saint Charles, Saint Louis and Ste. Genevieve.

As populations grew toward the west, the originals splintered and more counties were formed. By the time Missouri became a state in 1821, it had grown to 25 counties in nine years. The number of counties would grow even more in the next twenty years.

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"Missouri was the west before the west," Sean Rost of the Missouri Historical Society told the News-Leader. "It really boomed in late 19th century."

Greene County (1833) and Branson's Taney County (1837) followed. Christian County, one of the state's youngest counties, was established in 1859.

"If you look at many of the counties in the Ozarks, they're some of the youngest in the state," Rost said.

Not unique to Missouri

There are states smaller than Missouri in population and area that are even more packed with counties.

To the east, Kentucky has the fourth-most counties in the U.S. at 120. To the west is Kansas, which has 105 and has the sixth-most counties.

Texas (254), Georgia (159) and Virginia (133) top the list.

Missouri county facts

The most populous county in Missouri is St. Louis County (990,500 estimate) and the smallest is Worth County (1,955) in northwest Missouri.

The largest county by area is Texas County (1,179 square miles), in the southern portion of the state.