The Lone Oak plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
15° on Nov. 13, 2019, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1995. Next is 17° in 2014.
Lone Oak’s center stands about 1,990 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,530 ft to 2,230 ft, a difference of 700 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Bunker Hill, about 2,340 ft, 13 miles northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Crab Orchard Mountains Group, including Rockcastle Conglomerate, Vandever Formation, Newton Sandstone, Whitwell Shale, and Sewanee Conglomerate, from the Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old.
The section below crosses 13 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 11×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Conglomerate. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 11 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Limestone, dolostone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 7 smaller units along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Lone Oak reaches the Gulf of America by way of Lewis Creek, North Suck Creek, Suck Creek, the Tennessee, the Ohio and the Mississippi: about 1,470 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Guntersville Lake, White Lake (historical), Pickwick Lake and Cummings Lake.
970 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Lone Oak; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Lone Oak has a humid subtropical climate. Summer afternoons average 84° in July; winter nights fall to about 29° in January. About 59 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1995 at Lookout Mtn-Point Park, 13 miles south, 120 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.