Cover Story

French vintners imported Missouri rootstocks around the turn of the 20th century, only to find that Missouri grapevines sheltered a pest called phylloxera.

The MU Institute for Continental Climate Viticulture and Enology is spearheading research that could spur a Missouri wine renaissance and put the growing industry on the global map.

Although Americans can read at roughly the same level they could in the early 1990s, the demands of work, family and civic life require higher levels of literacy than they did before.

David Sallee, the 57-year-old backhoe driver and Vietnam veteran, is trying to build Sallee Post-Service Sanctuary, a 5-acre trailer park outside Hallsville that would shelter veterans who are homeless or have disabilities in seven new three-bedroom mobile homes.

Luke Pickett, an 18-month-old boy with a beaming smile and a frequent laugh, left for China on Oct. 4 with his father. There, he is scheduled to receive a donated umbilical cord blood stem cell transplant. With luck, it could reduce his symptoms of cerebral palsy. It's a long way to travel, and it's expensive, but the Pickett family says it's worth it.

The prairie can tell you many things, but it takes time to learn its language. Eighty-six-year-old Clair Kucera has been listening to the voice of Tucker Prairie for more than half a century.

The story of Albert-Oakland Park is complicated. But at the most basic level, it involves a family's legacy and one man's drive to preserve it.

Clara Miles' vision paved the way for a community like no other in its time — an upscale subdivision for black families in Columbia. Nearly 50 years later, Miles Manor is still going strong.

In Columbia Public Schools, “gifted” means an IQ above 130, though throughout the rest of Missouri the bar rests around 125. Less tangible characteristics of gifted students include a keen sense of humor, persistent intellectual curiosity, superior reasoning powers and vocabulary and a wide range of interests, according to the district, which last year served 1,271 gifted students from kindergarten through 12th grade.

A look at K-12 and higher education in Columbia, past and future.

People in Columbia post their photos on Flickr as a way to connect with other photographers about shared interests.

Anne Gamboa was living in Florida when her family discovered her squalid living conditions. They made the decision to bring her back to Missouri, which required buying a new house and moving to Ashland.

The terms that swirl around foreclosures and mortgages can often be more complicated than the process itself. Here’s a glossary to help make sense of the convoluted situations.

Homeowners who are confused, troubled or even just wondering about their status have options in securing their residential future.

Adjustable-rate mortgages, or ARMs, are complex because rates can differ from year to year, leaving homeowners confused and often troubled about how to move forward.

Although many agree Columbia and Boone County have suffered far less than many others in the nation, foreclosures have still had widespread effects on many group stakeholders in the Boone County mortgage market.

It took Zimbabwe native Munashe Chigerwe some time to warm up to Columbia, but a group of runners helped him find his stride and make the transition into his new life.

On display at the Museum of Art and Archaeology, there’s a little white disk in the middle of a room. It’s inconspicuous, at first — a simple bauble left by ancient American Indians who once called Missouri home. But peel away the layers of history, and you’ll see that the little disk is far more than an extremely old-school trinket.