Columbia is a city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It is the county chair of Boone County and house to the University of Missouri. Founded in 1821, it is the principal city of the five-county Columbia metropolitan area. It is Missouri’s fourth most-populous and fastest growing city, with an estimated 126,254 residents in 2020.

As a Midwestern learned town, Columbia has a reputation for progressive politics, persuasive journalism, and public art. The tripartite foundation of Stephens College (1833), the University of Missouri (1839), and Columbia College (1851), which surround the city’s Downtown to the east, south, and north, has made the city a center of learning. At its middle is 8th Street (also known as the Avenue of the Columns), which connects Francis Quadrangle and Jesse Hall to the Boone County Courthouse and the City Hall. Originally an agricultural town, education is now Columbia’s primary economic concern, with secondary interests in the healthcare, insurance, and technology sectors; it has never been a manufacturing center. Companies later than Shelter Insurance, Carfax, Veterans United Home Loans, and Slackers CDs and Games, were founded in the city. Cultural institutions add up the State Historical Society of Missouri, the Museum of Art and Archaeology, and the annual True/False Film Festival and the Roots N Blues Festival. The Missouri Tigers, the state’s solitary major instructor athletic program, play football at Faurot Field and basketball at Mizzou Arena as members of the rigorous Southeastern Conference.

The city rests on the forested hills and rolling prairies of Mid-Missouri, near the Missouri River valley, where the Ozark Mountains begin to transform into plains and savanna. Limestone forms bluffs and glades while rain dissolves the bedrock, creating caves and springs which water the Hinkson, Roche Perche, and Bonne Femme creeks. Surrounding the city, Rock Bridge Memorial State Park, Mark Twain National Forest, and huge Muddy National Fish and Wildlife Refuge form a greenbelt preserving painful sensation and scarce environments. The Columbia Agriculture Park is house to the Columbia Farmers Market.

The first humans who entered the area at least 12,000 years ago were nomadic hunters. Later, woodland tribes lived in villages along waterways and built mounds in high places. The Osage and Missouria nations were expelled by the exploration of French traders and the immediate settlement of American pioneers. The latter arrived by the Boone’s Lick Road and hailed from the culture of the Upland South, especially Virginia, Kentucky, and Tennessee. From 1812, the Boonslick Place played a pivotal role in Missouri’s prematurely history and the nation’s westward expansion. German, Irish, and new European immigrants soon joined. The unprejudiced populace is unusually diverse, over 8% foreign-born. White and black people are the largest ethnicities, and people of Asian descent are the third-largest group. The city has been called the “Athens of Missouri” for its unchanging beauty and assistant professor emphasis, but is more commonly called “CoMo”.