Mount Nittany

Mount Nittany is the common name for Nittany Mountain, a prominent geographic feature in Centre County, Pennsylvania. The mountain is actually part of a complex of ridges that separates Nittany Valley from Penns Valley, with the enclosed Sugar Valley between them. On USGS topographic maps, Nittany Mountain is generally shown as the lower ridge line that runs below Big Mountain on the west and Big Kettle Mountain on the east side, coming together to form a single ridge line at the southern terminus. This nomenclature is not always consistently applied to the same geologic formation, and there is a shorter Nittany Mountain ridge shown above the Sugar Valley as well.

The word Nittany is derived from the Algonquian language word Nit-A-Nee meaning "single mountain". In Penn State folklore, Nit-A-Nee is also the name of an Indian maiden whose actions caused Mount Nittany to be formed. The original inhabitants of the area used Nit-A-Nee to describe the mountain, and it likely became corrupted to Nittany by the first Europeans to settle the area in the 18th century. By the time of Penn State's founding in 1855, the word Nittany was already in use. Some sources cite the word Nit-A-Nee as meaning "barrier against the wind", which is not as likely.

In 1945 the landowners of Mount Nittany were preparing to sell the mountain, and allegedly timber rights also. The alumni of the Lion's Paw Senior Society heard of this, and bought an option to buy the mountain. It took the Lion's Paw alumni until May 1946 to raise the money needed to buy the mountain. In 1981, Lion's Paw established the Mount Nittany Conservancy, an organization intended to raise money from the general public in addition to the money raised by Lion's Paw members. Since its establishment, the Mount Nittany Conservancy has purchased hundreds of additional acres on Mount Nittany.