Whitetop Mountain is the second highest independent mountain 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 sover ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

, after nearby

Mount Rogers Mount Rogers is the highest natural point in Virginia, United States, with a summit elevation of above mean sea level. The summit straddles the border of Grayson and Smyth Counties, Virginia, about WSW of Troutdale, Virginia. Most of the mo ...

. It is also the third highest named peak in Virginia, after Mount Rogers and its subsidiary peak, Pine Mountain. It is located at the juncture of Grayson,

Smyth Smyth is an early variant of the common surname Smith commonly found in Ireland.Citation: Bardsley, 1901 Shown below are notable people who share the surname "Smyth". Notable people sharing the Smyth surname Listed here are people who share the ...

, and

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered on ...

Counties, and is also within the

Mount Rogers National Recreation Area Mount Rogers National Recreation Area is a United States national recreation area (NRA) in southwestern Virginia near the border with Tennessee and North Carolina. It centerpiece is the Lewis Fork Wilderness containing Mount Rogers, the highest p ...

of the

Jefferson National Forest The George Washington and Jefferson National Forests is an administrative entity combining two U.S. National Forests into one of the largest areas of public land in the Eastern United States. The forests cover of land in the Appalachian Mountai ...

. Whitetop was the location of the

White Top Folk Festival The White Top Folk Festival was a folk festival held on Whitetop Mountain in Grayson County, Virginia from 1931 to 1939. Established by Annabel Morris Buchanan, John Blakemore, and classical musician John Powell, it featured Appalachian folk ...

from 1932 to 1939, with the exception of 1937. Like nearby Mount Rogers, it represents an ecological "island" of flora and fauna commonly found much farther north than Virginia, such as old growth

red spruce ''Picea rubens'', commonly known as red spruce, is a species of spruce native to eastern North America, ranging from eastern Quebec and Nova Scotia, west to the Adirondack Mountains and south through New England along the Appalachians to western ...

and other northern softwoods. Whitetop Mountain is within a conservation area of the same name.Virginia's Mountain Treasures, report issued by The Wilderness Society, May, 1999

References

External links

Summitpost
- Information about Whitetop Mountain
TopoQuest
- Quad map Mountains of Virginia Blue Ridge Mountains Landforms of Grayson County, Virginia Landforms of Smyth County, Virginia Landforms of Washington County, Virginia {{WashingtonCountyVA-geo-stub