Missouri Show-Me State Plate
2024–presentMissouri · current · “Show-Me State”
Missouri law requires the words SHOW-ME STATE on the plate, which is why this design exists at all: the bicentennial plate it replaced had quietly dropped them for three years. The first letter of the serial encodes the month the registration expires. The nickname comes from an 1899 speech by Congressman Willard Vandiver, who said frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies him and that he was from Missouri, so you have got to show him. The plate shown is a reconstruction carrying an invented serial, so no real registration is depicted.
Still on the road
This is a current issue, first seen in 2024 and still being handed out. Nothing about it is settled history: the serial sequence is still advancing, and the design will only stop where the state decides to replace it.
Half stamped, half printed
Run a thumb across this plate and only the serial answers. The registration is still pressed into the metal the old way, while the state name, the slogan and any artwork are printed flat onto the reflective sheeting around it. Most plates issued in America today are made like this: the part that must be legible at speed and survive a decade of weather is stamped, and the part that carries the state's personality is printed, because printing can do colour and detail that a press cannot.
Sources
Reference photograph of an issued plate of the immediately preceding base, which differs from this design only in two legends. No photograph of the current base could be found in any source (All rights reserved, cited not reproduced). Issue date, the month-coded serial format, and the statutory requirement for the words Show-Me State (CC BY-SA).
- Issued
- Standard issue
- The plate you received by default when you registered a vehicle.
- Serial format
- AA9 A9A
- Material
- Aluminium: stamped serial and month on screened reflective sheeting
- Source license
- All rights reserved, cited not reproduced
- Reference
- View original