Come See Our Knob

Yosef the Mountaineer is the big guy enjoying the view.

 From Maine to Mississippi, more than two thousand mountains are known as knobs, based on an old German word for a prominent hill. These include the highest point in West Virginia, Spruce Knob, and six of the South's 20 highest peaks, Blackstock Knob, Waterrock Knob, Celo Knob, Black Balsam Knob, Roan High Knob, and Luftee Knob. It's not just an Appalachian expression, as there are dozens of "knobs" in Colorado and California.
 The ones that keep me busy, Elk Knob and Howard Knob, are more pedestrian. Elk Knob is the 52nd highest mountain in North Carolina, and I've made the four-mile round-trip hike 325 times, as of July 15. Howard Knob ranks among the 300 highest, and I've frequently driven to the top.

The massive 1979 windmill

 Howard Knob became famous as the site of an experimental NASA windmill, 1979-83, and as a backdrop for football games at Appalachian State University.
 The mountain is commonly called Howard's Knob, but the U.S. Board on Geographic Names eschews the apostrophe-s. The knob is named for Benjamin Howard, the grandfather of Boone. His daughter Sallie married Jordan Council, the father of Boone. Howard was a neghbor of Daniel Boone's family in Wilkes County, and Daniel stayed in Howard's hunting cabin during his western explorations.
 Since the windmill days, the mountaintop has been accessible by car. Watauga County put a park on the summit, and this year it's become a destination. The new park sign lists the summit as 4,396 feet above sea level, which is shorter than the 4,420 shown on topographic maps. I'm not sure of the source for this number, as the Watauga County GIS site shows a 4,415-foot contour. The USGS contour maps can be problematic, as Elk Knob is shown as 5,520 feet on maps and signs, yet it is 5,557 on the newest surveys.
 The new horseshoe-shaped skybridge offers a panoramic view of the High County, including the university campus and peeks into the stadiums at ASU (home of the national champions in 2005, 2006, and 2007), and Watauga High School (state champions 2025). On the ridge behind the ASU stadium stand three windmills that are heirs to the project that once stood on Howard Knob. The Blue Ridge Parkway follows the blue horizon past Grandfather Mountain.
 It's well worth the drive up the hill, less than 10 minutes from King Street in downtown Boone, staring on Cherry Street. You'll be able to park within 100 feet of the overlook.

From below, the bridge resembles a pop-top on the summit.

ASU's football stadium and windmills are on the western end of this panorama.

Boone United Methodist Church has built the Boone United Trail, which climbs halfway to Howard Knob, and may complete its route now that the right-of-way has been cleared. Watauga High School is in the background.

Before the Skybridge, this was the Howard Knob overlook.

 

 

In the Beauty of the Lilies

2025 Gray's Lily did not reappear in 2026.

 It's been a hard summer for the lilies on my favorite mountain.
 I always look forward to blooms of Gray's lilies in mid-June and Turks Cap Lilies in early July, but this was as sparse a season as I've seen. The Gray's Lily is found on only a few mile-high summits in the corner of North Carolina, Virginia, and Tennessee.
 For several years, I've been taking a census of Gray's Lilies on Elk Knob. These perennials are already considered rare, and I'm concerned that the population in 2026 seems to be in retreat. I found only four in 2026, compared to 33 flowers in 2025, 18 in 2024, 17 in 2023, and 12 in 2022.
 One patch that produced nine lilies in 2025 showed only one in 2026. Two prolific stalks that produced five and seven flowers did not sprout this year.
 This also was a lean year for flame azalea, which turn the mountaintop orange each June. The Turk's Cap lilies have certainly moved downhill, and we even had one bloom in the parking lot. I counted more than 50 blossoms along the trail, but there were none in the usual thicket past the 1.5-mile marker.
 My census is not scientific, and I generally count flowers visible from the trail. Except for a few patches, I don't bushwhack to find them. I don't want to trample them, and this year the state park put up fences and signs to protect endangered plants.
 On the Sunday after July 4, my church sang The Battle Hymn of the Republic, which I was surprised to learn was still in the Methodist Hymnal. I thought it had been exiled by pacificists, along with Onward Christian Soldiers.
 Our pastor, a former soldier himself, told how he once included that hymn in a worship service in Alabama, and one of the ladies of the church walked out in protest. "I'm not singing a Yankee song," she said.
 Indeed, The Battle Hymn of the Republic echoes John Brown's Body, a favorite tune of Union soldiers. Julia Ward Howe wrote the lyrics in 1861, four weeks after the bombardment of Fort Sumter. It also evokes the University of Georgia fight song, Glory, Glory to the Bulldogs, which might offend my pastor, an Auburn man.

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord,
He is tramping out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored. 
He has loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword,
His truth is marching on.

 The fourth stanza evokes the Song of Solomon and the Sermon on the Mount: 

In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea,
with a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me. 
As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
while God is marching on.

 The "Father of Botany," Asa Gray, discovered a red lily in 1840 on Roan Mountain, and his students named it for him. A colleague of Charles Darwin, Gray understood evolution as being guided by God's hand.

 In a wonderful coincidence, Gray and Julia Ward Howe, the lyricist for the Battle Hymn, now are pushing up daisies in the same graveyard, Mount Auburn Cemetery near Boston.

 Gray's Lily (lilium grayi), Turk's Cap Lily (lilium superbum), and Michigan Lily (lilium michiganense) bloom in June and July on Elk Knob. ln the spring, we are also blessed with yellow Trout Lilies (erythronium americanum), which Dr. Gray would tell us are not true lilies. 

 Elk Knob and the Roan are among the few places that Gray's lily can be found. They seem to prefer mile-high balds, and Elk Knob is in the process of going bald. 

 

Turk's Cap Lily

Two lilies that bloomed in a new location this year were "harvested"—I'm not sure if they were eaten by deer or picked for a dear. 

This Gray's Lily never bloomed, probably because of drought.

Skeletons of the Beech forest on the summit.

 

  Elk Knob is crowned by a beech forest, and many of the trees have been killed by a blight. As a result, the undergrowth is unusually thick, including a new generation of beech trees. I fear that this is choking out the lilies and the azaleas, which seemed to be retreating away from the summit. If you're looking for a science project, please come study the evolution of Elk Knob and apply Dr. Gray's understanding of theistic evolution.