Highest and Lowest Elevations (by State)
Arkansas
The highest point in Arkansas is Signal Hill, which is 839 meters (2753 feet) high. It is one of two peaks on Mount Magazine, a flat-topped plateau located in the Ozark National Forest. Arkansas’ lowest point, at 17 meters (55 feet) above sea level, is the portion of the Ouachita River that enters Louisiana.
Kansas
Kansas, while notoriously flat, slopes downward to the east. Mount Sunflower, half a mile from the state’s western border, is nearly indistinguishable from the surrounding flatland at 1231 meters (4309 feet) above sea level. The “summit” of this tongue-in-cheek topographic high point includes a sunflower sculpture made from railroad spikes and a plaque that reads “nothing happened here in 1897.” The Verdigris River at Kansas’ border with Oklahoma is the state’s lowest point, at 207 meters (679 feet) above sea level.
Louisiana
At an elevation of 163 meters (535 feet), Driskill Mountain might more properly be called a hill. This landform, located in north central Louisiana, was shaped by the erosion of unconsolidated Paleogene sediments. The state’s lowest point lies within the city of New Orleans, at 2 meters (6.5 feet) below sea level—a series of levees protect the city from being submerged.
Missouri
Taum Sauk Mountain is Missouri’s highest point. Although it stands just 540 meters (1772 feet) above sea level, this mountain is part of the ancient St. Francois Mountains and is several times older than the Appalachians. Taum Sauk and the surrounding mountains are among the only landforms in the US to have never been submerged in prehistoric seas. Missouri’s lowest point, at 70 meters (230 feet), is located where the Saint Francis River borders Arkansas.
Oklahoma
Oklahoma’s highest point is Black Mesa, at 1516 meters (4975 feet) in elevation. It is located in the westernmost part of the Oklahoma panhandle, less than a mile east of the New Mexico border. Over 18 tons of dinosaur bones have been recovered from the Black Mesa. The lowest point in Oklahoma lies at 88 meters (289 feet) above sea level and is located on the Little River at the Arkansas border.
Texas
Guadalupe Peak, an ancient limestone reef that rises abruptly from the Chihuahuan Desert, is the highest point in Texas at 2667 meters (8751 feet) above sea level. It is located within Guadalupe Mountains National Park, just 16 kilometers (10 miles) south of the New Mexico border. The lowest area in Texas is the shore of the Gulf of Mexico, which lies at sea level.