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Mount Magazine, officially named Magazine Mountain, is the highest point of the U.S. Interior Highlands and the U.S. state of
Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States. It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma ...
, and is the site of Mount Magazine State Park. It is a flat-topped mountain or
mesa A mesa is an isolated, flat-topped elevation, ridge, or hill, bounded from all sides by steep escarpments and standing distinctly above a surrounding plain. Mesas consist of flat-lying soft sedimentary rocks, such as shales, capped by a ...
capped by hard rock and rimmed by precipitous cliffs. There are two summits atop the mountain: Signal Hill, which reaches , and Mossback Ridge, which reaches . Mount Magazine is often called "the highest point between the Alleghenies and the Rockies" (there are mountains located in the Trans-Pecos region of far-west
Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...
which exceed Mount Magazine in elevation and prominence, although the Trans-Pecos region lies so far south of the Rockies, that region arguably lies not "between" the Allegheny Mountains and the Rocky Mountains).


Etymology

According to English botanist
Thomas Nuttall Thomas Nuttall (5 January 1786 – 10 September 1859) was an English botanist and zoologist who lived and worked in America from 1808 until 1841. Nuttall was born in the village of Long Preston, near Settle in the West Riding of Yorkshire a ...
, writing in 1819, French hunters named the mountain "Magazine" or "Barn" (French ) because of its "peculiar form". However, today some scholars believe Nuttall may have been writing about nearby
Mount Nebo Mount Nebo (; ) is an elevated ridge located in Jordan, approximately Height above sea level, above sea level. Part of the Abarim mountain range, Mount Nebo is mentioned in the Bible as the place where Moses was granted a view of the Promised L ...
, and what is today called Mount Magazine was labeled "Castete Mt" on Nuttall's maps.


Location

Mount Magazine is located due north of Blue Mountain Lake in Logan County, Arkansas, approximately east of the Arkansas-Oklahoma border. The most scenic route to the top is a drive along Highway 309 (also known as the Mount Magazine Scenic Byway) from
Havana Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.Ouachita Mountains The Ouachita Mountains (), simply referred to as the Ouachitas, are a mountain range in western Arkansas and southeastern Oklahoma. They are formed by a thick succession of highly deformed Paleozoic strata constituting the Ouachita Fold and Thru ...
, and is part of the Arkansas River Valley ecoregion. It lies within a southern extension of the Ozark National Forest close to the
Ouachita National Forest The Ouachita National Forest is a vast congressionally-designated United States National Forest, National Forest that lies in the western portion of Arkansas and portions of extreme-eastern Oklahoma, USA. History The Ouachita National Forest is ...
.


Climate

The climate is very different from the typical climate of Arkansas state as temperatures remain 10 degrees cooler than normal temperatures in the valleys. The annual average temperature is 56 °F. The park gets 54 inches of rainfall every year, and due to the low clouds, there is fog and limited visibility all year for eight days each month.


Summer

The summer temperature very rarely reaches 100 degrees Fahrenheit on the mountaintop and the hottest average temperature during the summer in the park is 90 degrees Fahrenheit.


Winter

The mountain has limited forest due to the harsh weather during the wintertime. Normal conditions like frost, sleet, hail, snow, and freezing rain can cause the limbs of trees to snap. Higher up on the mountain, frost flowers,
ice crystals Ice crystals are solid water (known as ice) in crystal structure, symmetrical shapes including hexagonal crystal family, hexagonal columns, hexagonal plates, and dendrite (crystal), dendritic crystals. Ice crystals are responsible for various at ...
, hoarfrost,
rime ice Rime ice forms when supercooled water droplets freeze onto surfaces. In the atmosphere, there are three basic types of rime ice: *Soft rime forms when supercooled water freezes under calm wind conditions. It is milky and crystalline, like sugar ...
, and freezing fog can occur.


Geology

As the South American plate collided with the North American plate during the late
Paleozoic The Paleozoic ( , , ; or Palaeozoic) Era is the first of three Era (geology), geological eras of the Phanerozoic Eon. Beginning 538.8 million years ago (Ma), it succeeds the Neoproterozoic (the last era of the Proterozoic Eon) and ends 251.9 Ma a ...
, a major
foreland basin A foreland basin is a structural basin that develops adjacent and parallel to a mountain belt. Foreland basins form because the immense mass created by crustal thickening associated with the evolution of a mountain belt causes the lithospher ...
, the Arkoma Basin, developed north of the
Ouachita Mountains The Ouachita Mountains (), simply referred to as the Ouachitas, are a mountain range in western Arkansas and southeastern Oklahoma. They are formed by a thick succession of highly deformed Paleozoic strata constituting the Ouachita Fold and Thru ...
. Small grains of sediment that had filled the Arkoma Basin were compacted and cemented into sedimentary rock. As the land rose above sea level, small streams developed that eventually merged into the
Arkansas River The Arkansas River is a major tributary of the Mississippi River. It generally flows to the east and southeast as it traverses the U.S. states of Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas. The river's source basin lies in Colorado, specifically ...
. After millions of years of erosion, synclines like Mount Magazine have become the most positive topographic features; this phenomenon is the result of the rapid weathering of shales once sandstones were breached on the flanks of surrounding
anticline In structural geology, an anticline is a type of Fold (geology), fold that is an arch-like shape and has its oldest Bed (geology), beds at its core, whereas a syncline is the inverse of an anticline. A typical anticline is convex curve, c ...
s. Mount Magazine is a broad
mesa A mesa is an isolated, flat-topped elevation, ridge, or hill, bounded from all sides by steep escarpments and standing distinctly above a surrounding plain. Mesas consist of flat-lying soft sedimentary rocks, such as shales, capped by a ...
composed of Pennsylvanian sedimentary rocks deposited in various shallow-water environments. Like many mountains in the western Arkansas River Valley, Mount Magazine is capped by the Savanna Formation, a sequence of
shale Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock formed from mud that is a mix of flakes of Clay mineral, clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g., Kaolinite, kaolin, aluminium, Al2Silicon, Si2Oxygen, O5(hydroxide, OH)4) and tiny f ...
, siltstone, and
sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...
; the upper portion of this sequence is missing throughout most of Arkansas. The Savanna Formation is conformable with the underlying McAlester Formation, a sequence of shale, siltstone, sandstone, and several
coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other Chemical element, elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal i ...
beds. The McAlester Formation is conformable with the underlying Hartshorne Sandstone, a prominent ledge-former under favorable structural conditions. The Hartshorne Sandstone is unconformable with the underlying Atoka Formation. This unit has the largest areal extent of any of the
Paleozoic The Paleozoic ( , , ; or Palaeozoic) Era is the first of three Era (geology), geological eras of the Phanerozoic Eon. Beginning 538.8 million years ago (Ma), it succeeds the Neoproterozoic (the last era of the Proterozoic Eon) and ends 251.9 Ma a ...
formations in Arkansas, extending as far north as the Boston Mountains, and is divided into upper, middle, and lower members.


Nature & Attractions

Mount Magazine promotes environmental conservation through an Eco-friendly nature attraction that allows visitors to explore nature. It also consists of 18 campsites for nature-lovers. An annual butterfly festival is hosted each June in the Paris town square.


Animals

The park is home to many species including the shagreen snail, black bear,
white-tailed deer The white-tailed deer (''Odocoileus virginianus''), also known Common name, commonly as the whitetail and the Virginia deer, is a medium-sized species of deer native to North America, North, Central America, Central and South America. It is the ...
, rufous-crowned sparrows (rare), and 94 of the 134 butterfly species of Arkansas. The rarest butterfly species is the Diana Fritillary.


Activities

Activities include the following: hiking, biking, bird watching, horseback riding, hang gliding, rappelling, rock climbing, sightseeing, and photography. ATV riding is also allowed as there is a guide to the activity.


See also

* List of mountains of Arkansas *
List of U.S. states by elevation A list is a set of discrete items of information collected and set forth in some format for utility, entertainment, or other purposes. A list may be memorialized in any number of ways, including existing only in the mind of the list-maker, but ...


References


External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Magazine, Mount Highest points of U.S. states Protected areas of Logan County, Arkansas Mountains of Arkansas Ozark–St. Francis National Forest Landforms of Logan County, Arkansas