Qualla: Holston Mountain

Holston Mountain: Introduction

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wd4sbx, CC BY-SA 4.0. On Rye Patch Knob, a single steel tower reaches 341 feet into the air. From its base on a ridge 4,260 feet above sea level, the antenna tip touches 4,533 feet - the highest man-made structure in Tennessee, Virginia, and Kentucky. It's a television transmitter for WCYB Channel 5, broadcasting from the highest visible point that faces nearly every city in upper East Tennessee and southwest Virginia. Holston Mountain has been doing this job since the 1950s, when the first broadcasters realized one ridge could light up six valleys.

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Image: Wd4sbx | CC BY-SA 4.0

Holston Mountain: Named for a Common Settler

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wd4sbx, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1746, a man named Stephen Holston - descendant of a Swedish immigrant from the colony of New Sweden - moved west and built a cabin near the headwaters of a small creek. The next year, surveyors mapping the area called the creek Holston's Creek, simply because Stephen Holston l...

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Image: Wd4sbx | CC BY-SA 4.0

Holston Mountain: 28 Miles of Ridge

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ryan Rice at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. Holston Mountain is the textbook Appalachian ridge - a 28-mile spine running southwest to northeast, covering about 268 square miles in Tennessee's Ridge and Valley region. The Cherokee National Forest manages most of its slopes. Four named summits stand above 4,000 feet: Holston...

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Image: Ryan Rice at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0

Holston Mountain: The Antenna Farm

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Wd4sbx, CC BY-SA 4.0. Five television stations transmit from Holston Mountain into the Tri-Cities market. WCYB Channel 5 broadcasts from Rye Patch Knob. WJHL Channel 11 (Johnson City) and WKPT Channel 19 (Kingsport) share an antenna farm a mile southwest, on the slope of Holston High Point - their tow...

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Image: Wd4sbx | CC BY-SA 4.0

Holston Mountain: Plane Crashes and Blue Hole Falls

Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ryan Rice at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0. The same height that made Holston a broadcasting prize has cost lives. On October 1, 1976, a German military RF-4C Phantom reconnaissance plane on a training flight from Shaw Air Force Base crashed near the crest of Holston Mountain, killing both crewmen - First Lieutenant Kurt S...

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Image: Ryan Rice at en.wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0