Glabrous or rarely short-hairy, 2–6 dm; lvs ± numerous, firm, linear or nearly so, the lowest small and subsheathing, the next longer, 10–25 cm × 2–12 mm, the rest reduced upward; heads few or even solitary, stiffly pedunculate or sessile; invol 11–20 mm, broadly cylindric or cylindric-campanulate, its bracts firm, appressed or a little loose, generally broadly rounded and shortly mucronate, occasionally more tapering or without the mucro; fls 10–35 per head, the cor-lobes coarsely hairy within; pappus evidently plumose; 2n=20. Dry, open places; w. N.Y. and s. Ont. to s. O., n. Ind., Mich., and Minn., s. to Mo. and irregularly to Tenn. and Ala. July–Sept.