Snowshoe is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in Pocahontas County,

West Virginia West Virginia is a mountainous U.S. state, state in the Southern United States, Southern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States.The United States Census Bureau, Census Bureau and the Association of American ...

, United States, centering on the Snowshoe Mountain ski resort. It is situated in the Allegheny Mountains at a bowl shaped convergence of two high mountain ridges — Cheat and

Back Allegheny Mountain Back Allegheny Mountain is a long mountain ridge in eastern West Virginia. It is part of the Shavers Fork Mountain Complex in the Allegheny Mountains, Allegheny Range of the Appalachians. Geography Back Allegheny Mountain runs north to south a ...

s — at the head of the Shavers Fork of the Cheat River. Snowshoe is site of the second highest point in the state and the peak

elevation The elevation of a geographic location (geography), ''location'' is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational equipotenti ...

for Cheat Mountain, at Thorny Flat, which reaches

above sea level Height above mean sea level is a measure of a location's vertical distance (height, elevation or altitude) in reference to a vertical datum based on a historic mean sea level. In geodesy, it is formalized as orthometric height. The zero level ...

. Snowshoe has several commercial areas, with the most prominent being The Village at Snowshoe, located at the summit of the mountain (rather than at its base). While the area is still best known for winter activities, today the resort has extensive mountain biking

trail A trail, also known as a path or track, is an unpaved lane or a small paved road (though it can also be a route along a navigable waterways) generally not intended for usage by motorized vehicles, usually passing through a natural area. Ho ...

s, a popular

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various Golf club, clubs to hit a Golf ball, ball into a series of holes on a golf course, course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standa ...

course, wedding and convention areas, a number of summer outdoor activities, and also hosts a Grand National Cross Country racing event. About 480,000 skiers visit the area each year, primarily from

and the larger cities of the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast. Snowshoe Mountain's large property includes several developed resort areas, a conservation area, and expansive backcountry that covers in total. Ski slopes make up of the resort, which include the Snowshoe Basin, Western Territory, and Silver Creek areas.

History

The area, then indistinct from Slatyfork, had been logged from about 1905 to 1960, after which it was abandoned. Thomas "Doc" Brigham discovered the mountain and believed it would be a good location to build a new ski resort. Brigham, a dentist from North Carolina, had previously opened the Sugar Mountain and Beech Mountain ski areas. Snowshoe Mountain opened to skiing on December 13, 1974.

Climate

With a mean temperature of (as seen in the climate box below) in January and in July, Snowshoe can be considerably cooler than nearby areas at lower elevations. The average winter season is just slightly more than 130 days each year, while the spring, summer, and fall seasons typically include a series of sports, recreation, and cultural events. Snowshoe has a

humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers, and cold ...

( Dfb). The resort's altitude at almost a mile high provides for weather conditions that more closely resemble the rigorous winters of Northern

New England New England is a region consisting of six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York (state), New York to the west and by the ...

than the milder climate of the Upland South. The massive horseshoe formed by the Cheat Mountain Range creates its own micro-climate, frequently affected by orographic lift of mid-level Great Lake moisture-laden fronts, resulting in massive snowfalls. Snowshoe averages over 13 feet of natural snow per year.

Popular culture

*Snowshoe as well as the Top of the World Ski Resort is a location in the game Fallout 76

References

External links

* {{authority control Unincorporated communities in Pocahontas County, West Virginia Unincorporated communities in West Virginia