Maya Angelou grew up primarily in the small town of Stamps, Arkansas, where she lived with her grandmother for much of her childhood and youth.

She was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and spent her first few years there before her parents’ divorce led to her and her brother being sent to live with their grandmother in Stamps. Although she moved back and forth between St. Louis and Stamps for a few years, the place most closely associated with her growing up—emotionally and in her later writing—is Stamps, Arkansas.