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History of the term Midwest

The term West was applied to the region in the early years of the country. In 1789, the Northwest Ordinance was enacted, creating the Northwest Territory, which was bounded by the Great Lakes and the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. Because the Northwest Territory lay between the East Coast and the then-far-West, the states carved out of it were called the "Northwest". In the early 19th century, anything west of the Mississippi River was considered the West, and the Midwest was the region east of the Mississippi and west of the Appalachians. In time, some users began to include Minnesota, Iowa and Missouri in the Midwest. With the settlement of the western prairie, the new term Great Plains States was used for the row of states from North Dakota to Kansas. Later, these states also came to be considered Midwest by some.

The states of the "old Northwest" are now called the "East North Central States" by the United States Census Bureau and the "Great Lakes" region by some of its inhabitants, whereas the states just west of the Mississippi and the Great Plains states are called the "West North Central States" by the Census Bureau. Today people as far west as the prairie sections of Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana sometimes identify themselves with the term Midwest.[6] Some parts of the Midwest are still referred to as "Northwest" for historical reasons – for example, Minnesota-based Northwest Airlines and Northwestern University in Illinois – so the Northwest region of the country is called the "Pacific Northwest" to make a clear distinction.