Paw Paw is a community in south central
Sullivan County, in the
U.S. state
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...
of
Missouri
Missouri is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee): Iowa to the north, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee to the east, Arkansas t ...
, which the
GNIS
The Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) is a database of name and locative information about more than two million physical and cultural features throughout the United States and its territories, Antarctica, and the associated states of ...
classifies as a populated place.
The community is located approximately one third mile north of Paw Paw Creek, approximately south-southeast of
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
and northeast of
Browning.
The name was sometimes spelled "Pawpaw".
A post office called Pawpaw was established in 1899 and remained in operation until 1905. The community most likely was so named because of the
paw paw thicket
A thicket is a very dense stand of trees or tall shrubs, often dominated by only one or a few species, to the exclusion of all others. They may be formed by species that shed large numbers of highly viable seeds that are able to germinate in t ...
s near the original town site.
References
Ghost towns in Missouri
Former populated places in Sullivan County, Missouri
{{SullivanCountyMO-geo-stub