Allegheny Front

Whispering Spruce Trail on Spruce Mountain

The Allegheny Front is the high eastern edge of the Allegheny Plateau and the Allegheny Mountains. It is an escarpment that follows the general trend of the Appalachian Mountains northwest-to-southeast across the the northeastern United States.

At its northern extent, Allegheny Front arises in southern Pennsylvania near Altoona, and forms a continuous, defined mountainous edge southwestward through western Maryland and into eastern West Virginia. Part of the front forms the Eastern Continental Divide.

The highest part of the crest is at Spruce Knob at 4,862 feet above sea level, the highest point in West Virginia. It front’s lowest point is at 790 feet above sea level in a pass through which the North Branch of the Potomac River descends near Keyser, West Virginia. Much of the front in West Virginia exceeds 4,000 feet in elevation. Its southern edge becomes less well-defined near Mount Porte Crayon (4,770 ft.), after which it extends in a line of high ridges. These include Spruce Mountain, on the state high point is located, and Allegheny Mountain, which the state line with Virginia follows southward as a less well-defined ridge.

Similar escarpments parallel the front near its southern extend, including many eastern slopes of Allegheny Mountains and that of Shavers Mountain and Back-Allegheny Mountain.

The front is an important landmark in the Fallout 76 video game, in which it is called the Savage Divide, its name inspired by Big Savage Mountain, a highland formed by the front in Maryland.