Mount Mitchell

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Highest mountain in North Carolina, United States

title: "Mount Mitchell" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["appalachian-culture-in-north-carolina", "blue-ridge-mountains", "blue-ridge-national-heritage-area", "highest-points-of-u.s.-states", "landmarks-in-north-carolina", "mountains-of-north-carolina", "national-natural-landmarks-in-north-carolina", "two-thousanders-of-the-united-states", "mountains-of-yancey-county,-north-carolina", "southern-sixers", "western-north-carolina"] description: "Highest mountain in North Carolina, United States" topic_path: "geography/united-states" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Mitchell" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Highest mountain in North Carolina, United States ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox mountain"]

Field	Value
name	Mount Mitchell
photo	File:Mount Mitchell from Mt. Mitchell overlook NC.jpg
photo_caption	Mount Mitchell, viewed from the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina
elevation_ft	6684
elevation_ref
prominence_ft	6089
prominence_ref
isolation	1189 mi
listing	{{unbulleted list
location	Yancey County, North Carolina, U.S.
range	Appalachian Mountains
map	USA North Carolina#USA
map_caption	North Carolina, U.S.
label_position	right
coordinates
coordinates_ref
topo	USGS Mount Mitchell
easiest_route	Hike
::

::callout[type=note] the North Carolina mountain ::

| name = Mount Mitchell | photo = File:Mount Mitchell from Mt. Mitchell overlook NC.jpg | photo_caption = Mount Mitchell, viewed from the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina | elevation_ft = 6684 | elevation_ref = | prominence_ft = 6089 | prominence_ref = | isolation = 1189 mi | listing = {{unbulleted list |World most isolated peaks 31st |North America isolated peaks 4th |US most prominent peaks 62nd |U.S. state high points 16th |Ultra | location = Yancey County, North Carolina, U.S. | range = Appalachian Mountains | map = USA North Carolina#USA | map_caption = North Carolina, U.S. | label_position = right | coordinates = | range_coordinates = | coordinates_ref = | topo = USGS Mount Mitchell | first_ascent = | easiest_route = Hike

Mount Mitchell (Attakulla in Cherokee) is the highest peak of the Appalachian Mountains and the highest peak in mainland North America east of the Mississippi River. It is located near Burnsville in Yancey County, North Carolina in the Black Mountain subrange of the Appalachians about 19 mi northeast of Asheville. It is protected by Mount Mitchell State Park and surrounded by the Pisgah National Forest. Mount Mitchell's elevation is 6684 ft above sea level. Mount Mitchell is ranked 31st by topographic isolation.

Geography

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/MountMitchellSurveyorsMark.jpg" caption="Surveyor's mark embedded in the observation tower notes the elevation of 6684-feet above sea level"] ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fc/Mount_Mitchell_Fall_Foliage.JPG" caption="Fall foliage at Mount Mitchell"] ::

The peak is the highest mountain in the United States east of the Mississippi River, and the highest in all of eastern North America south of the Arctic Cordillera. Barbeau Peak is higher but is located in the very remote Canadian Arctic. The nearest higher peaks are in the Black Hills of South Dakota and the highland foothills of Colorado. The mountain's topographic isolation is calculated from the nearest discernible single higher point: Lone Butte, which is 1,189 miles (1,913 km) away in southeastern Colorado.

History

Mount Mitchell was the highest mountain of the United States from 1789 until the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 when Mount Elbert became the highest mountain claimed by the United States. Mount Mitchell was also the most isolated peak in the United States from 1789 until the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 when Mount Whitney became the most isolated.

The Cherokee people, who long occupied this area as part of their homeland, called the mountain Attakulla. European-American settlers first called the mountain Black Dome for its rounded shape. They later named it after Elisha Mitchell, a professor at the University of North Carolina, who first explored the Black Mountain region in 1835. He determined that the height of the range exceeded by several hundred feet that of Mount Washington in New Hampshire. The latter had been commonly thought at the time to be the highest point in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. Mitchell fell to his death at nearby Mitchell Falls in 1857, where he had returned to verify his earlier measurements.

A 4.6 mile road (NC 128) connects the scenic Blue Ridge Parkway to a parking lot where a steep paved 980 ft trail leads through a conifer forest to the summit. The 40 ft stone observation tower on the summit was torn down in late 2006. A new observation deck was constructed and opened to visitors in January 2009.{{cite web | url = http://ncparks.gov/Visit/parks/momi/main.php | title = Mount Mitchell State Park | publisher = North Carolina State Parks | access-date = 2008-12-28 | archive-date = 2008-12-26 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20081226024244/http://www.ncparks.gov/Visit/parks/momi/main.php | url-status = dead

Description

Mount Mitchell was formed during the Precambrian when marine deposits were metamorphosed into gneiss and schist. These metasedimentary rocks were later uplifted during the Alleghenian orogeny. The soils are well drained, dark brown and stony with fine-earth material ranging in texture from sandy clay loam to loam or sandy loam; Burton and Craggey are the most common series around the summit.

Environment

The mountain's summit is coated in a dense stand of Southern Appalachian spruce-fir forest, which consists primarily of two evergreen species—the red spruce and the Fraser fir. Most of the mature Fraser firs, however, were killed off by the non-native Balsam woolly adelgid in the latter half of the 20th century. The high elevations expose plant life to high levels of pollution, including acid precipitation in the form of rain, snow, and fog. These acids damage the red spruce trees in part by releasing natural metals from the soil, such as aluminum, and by leaching important minerals. To what extent this pollution harms the high-altitude ecosystem is debatable.

While the mountain is still mostly lush and green in the summer, many dead Fraser fir trunks can be seen due to these serious problems. Reducing air pollution is a difficult issue, as the pollutants are often carried by air to this area from long distances. Sources can be local or hundreds of miles away, requiring cooperation from as far away as the Midwest.

Wildflowers are abundant all summer long. Young fir and spruce trees do well in the subalpine climate, and their cones feed the birds along with wild blueberry and blackberry shrubs.

The second highest point in eastern North America, Mount Craig at 6647 ft, is roughly a mile to the north of Mount Mitchell.

Climate

| Mount Mitchell | 17.0 | 33.4 | 6.54 | 18.2 | 35.3 | 5.86 | 23.7 | 40.7 | 7.05 | 31.3 | 49.0 | 5.70 | 41.2 | 57.0 | 5.32 | 49.0 | 63.1 | 5.74 | 52.3 | 65.9 | 5.81 | 51.7 | 65.1 | 7.16 | 46.0 | 60.4 | 7.49 | 36.7 | 53.1 | 5.09 | 28.3 | 45.0 | 6.68 | 20.6 | 36.4 | 6.23 | units = imperial | float = right | clear = none | source = NOAA }} The summit area of Mount Mitchell is marked by a warm-summer humid continental climate (Köppen Dfb), with mild summers and long, moderately cold winters, being more similar to southeastern Canada than the southeastern U.S. The monthly daily average temperature ranges from 25.1 °F in January to 59.6 °F in July. The coldest temperature ever recorded in the state occurred there on January 21, 1985, when it fell to -34 °F, during a severe cold spell. It is also the coldest average reporting station in the state at 42.9 °F, well below any other station. |url = http://www.nc-climate.ncsu.edu/climate/extremes.html |title = Extreme Weather Records |publisher = State Climate Office of North Carolina |access-date = 2007-03-27 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070512231842/http://www.nc-climate.ncsu.edu/climate/extremes.html |archive-date = 2007-05-12

Unlike the lower elevations in the surrounding regions, heavy snows often fall from December to March, with 50 in accumulating in the Great Blizzard of 1993 and 33 in in the January 2016 blizzard. Due to the high elevation, precipitation is heavy and reliable year-round, averaging 81.09 in for the year, with no month receiving less than 5 in of average precipitation. The summit is often windy, with recorded gusts of up to 178 mph.{{cite web | url = http://www.ncparks.gov/News/newsletter/print/aug2003.pdf | title = Mount Mitchell Webcam Activated | work = The Steward | date = August 2003 | page = 3 | publisher = North Carolina Division of Parks and Recreation | access-date = 2010-01-06 | archive-date = 2010-04-16 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20100416222523/http://www.ncparks.gov/News/newsletter/print/aug2003.pdf | url-status = dead

Mount Mitchell recorded a new state record of 139.94 in of precipitation in 2018, which is also the highest total rainfall recorded during a calendar year anywhere east of the Cascade Range in the Contiguous United States.

| Jan record low F = −34 | Feb record low F = −23 | Mar record low F = -15 | Apr record low F = 1 | May record low F = 13 | Jun record low F = 27 | Jul record low F = 36 | Aug record low F = 32 | Sep record low F = 23 | Oct record low F = 5 | Nov record low F = -19 | Dec record low F = -22 | year record low F = −34 | precipitation colour = green | Jan precipitation inch = 7.47 | Feb precipitation inch = 5.62 | Mar precipitation inch = 7.22 | Apr precipitation inch = 6.52 | May precipitation inch = 6.08 | Jun precipitation inch = 5.46 | Jul precipitation inch = 6.92 | Aug precipitation inch = 7.69 | Sep precipitation inch = 8.76 | Oct precipitation inch = 6.29 | Nov precipitation inch = 6.17 | Dec precipitation inch = 6.89 | year precipitation inch = 81.09 | Jan snow inch = 19.2 | Feb snow inch = 18.6 | Mar snow inch = 18.5 | Apr snow inch = 7.1 | May snow inch = 1.4 | Jun snow inch = 0.0 | Jul snow inch = 0.0 | Aug snow inch = 0.0 | Sep snow inch = 0.0 | Oct snow inch = 0.7 | Nov snow inch = 3.9 | Dec snow inch = 19.7 | year snow inch = 89.1 | unit precipitation days = 0.01 in | Jan precipitation days = 14.1 | Feb precipitation days = 12.4 | Mar precipitation days = 14.1 | Apr precipitation days = 12.6 | May precipitation days = 14.2 | Jun precipitation days = 16.1 | Jul precipitation days = 17.8 | Aug precipitation days = 16.1 | Sep precipitation days = 12.7 | Oct precipitation days = 10.3 | Nov precipitation days = 10.4 | Dec precipitation days = 13.1 | year precipitation days = 163.9 | unit snow days = 0.1 in | Jan snow days = 6.4 | Feb snow days = 6.5 | Mar snow days = 4.9 | Apr snow days = 2.5 | May snow days = 0.3 | Jun snow days = 0.0 | Jul snow days = 0.0 | Aug snow days = 0.0 | Sep snow days = 0.0 | Oct snow days = 0.4 | Nov snow days = 2.0 | Dec snow days = 5.2 | year snow days = 28.2 | source 1 = NOAA{{cite web | url = https://www.weather.gov/wrh/climate?wfo=gsp | title = NowData – NOAA Online Weather Data | publisher = National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration | access-date = May 11, 2021 | archive-date = June 28, 2015 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150628163725/http://w2.weather.gov/climate/xmacis.php?wfo=gsp | url-status = live | url = https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/services/data/v1?dataset=normals-monthly-1991-2020&startDate=0001-01-01&endDate=9996-12-31&stations=USC00315923&format=pdf | publisher = National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration | title = Station: MT Mitchell, NC | work = U.S. Climate Normals 2020: U.S. Monthly Climate Normals (1991–2020) | access-date = May 11, 2021 | archive-date = 2021-05-11 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210511211910/https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/services/data/v1?dataset=normals-monthly-1991-2020&startDate=0001-01-01&endDate=9996-12-31&stations=USC00315923&format=pdf | url-status = live

References

{{cite peakbagger
{{cite gnis
Bradford, Erin. (2019-12-05). "North Carolina Gazetteer". NCpedia.
(2006). "Southern United States: An Environmental History". ABC-CLIO.
"Mount Mitchell State Park {{!}} NC State Parks". State of North Carolina.
Timothy Silver. (2003). "Mount Mitchell and the Black Mountains: An Environmental History of the Highest Peaks in Eastern America". Univ of North Carolina Press.
[http://casoilresource.lawr.ucdavis.edu/gmap/ SoilWeb] {{Webarchive. link. (2013-05-14 , University of California-Davis California Soil Resource Lab, Natural Resources Conservation Service. Accessed: 11 January 2016.)
Steve Nash, ''Blue Ridge 2020: An Owner's Manual'' (Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 1999), pp. 25-28, 61-63.
Chris Stachelski. (May 6, 2016). "SCEC Decision: New 24 Hour Snowfall Record For North Carolina". National Centers for Environmental Information.
Livingston, Ian. (2019-12-05). "In 2018, 94 inches of rain deluged Sperryville, Va., setting a state record". [[The Washington Post]].

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