Guadalupe Peak

Type: General Entry

Published: 1952

Updated: January 1, 1995

Guadalupe Peak, also known as Signal Peak, is the highest point in Texas. It is in Guadalupe Mountains National Park three miles west of Pine Springs in northwestern Culberson County (at 31°53' N, 104°52' W). Its summit, with an elevation of 8,749 feet above sea level, rises 3,100 feet above Pine Springs. The peak towers over nearby Guadalupe Pass, and nineteenth-century travelers, including John Russell Bartlett, were often deceived by the peak's great height and the clear mountain air; they reported seeing the peak a full week before they reached it and consistently underestimated their distance from it.

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John Russell Bartlett, Personal Narrative of Explorations...Connected with the United States and Mexican Boundary Commission (New York: Appleton, 1854; rpt., Chicago: Rio Grande Press, 1965). Roscoe P. and Margaret B. Conkling, The Butterfield Overland Mail, 1857–1869 (3 vols., Glendale, California: Clark, 1947). Alan Tennant, The Guadalupe Mountains of Texas (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1980).

The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this entry.

Anonymous, “Guadalupe Peak,” Handbook of Texas Online, accessed June 26, 2022, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/guadalupe-peak.

Published by the Texas State Historical Association.

Original Publication Date:: 1952
Most Recent Revision Date:: January 1, 1995

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