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Fire lookout · Lee County, Alabama

Beauregard Lookout Tower

Lee County, AL tower erected in 1948 by Alabama Forestry Commission personnel, one of two built for the county; NHLR-registered 2009. Staffing and current access not documented.

Visit & stay

Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.

Access

Access unknown

We do not know the access rules. Check with the land manager before you go.

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
Unknown
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a tower100' Aermotor MC-39 steel tower with 7'x7' steel cabThe design: Aermotor MC-39
Built of
Steel
Built
1948
Height
100 ft (30.5 m)
Elevation
705 ft (215 m)
Agency
Alabama Forestry Commission
Land
Unknown
Location
Lee County, Alabama
Coordinates
32.53805, −85.37138
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-al-beauregard

View from the cab

What you see from the cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.

Downloads about 3.1 MB of terrain data the first time.

Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1948 BuiltErected by Alabama Forestry Commission personnel as one of two Lee County fire towersSource: nhlr.org
  2. 1949 EventSalem Lookout Tower, the second Lee County tower, was built this year and has since been dismantled (not this lookout)Source: nhlr.org
  3. No record between 1949 and 2009
  4. 2009 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered December 2, 2009 as US 842, AL 21; nominated by Thomas KaufmannSource: nhlr.org
  5. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

Old maps of this spot

USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Beauregard Lookout Tower is in Lee County, Alabama, and the register gives its elevation as 705 feet.1 The Alabama Forestry Commission erected it in 1948, using its own personnel, as one of two towers built to protect Lee County from fire.1 The register describes it as a 100-foot Aermotor MC-39 built of steel, with a cab measuring 7 by 7 feet.1

The county's other tower, Salem Lookout Tower, was built in 1949 and has since been taken down.1 The register describes Beauregard as the county's only remaining historic firetower.1 It does not say when Salem came down.1

We found no source that names anyone who staffed the tower or any fire it watched.

The register entry was made on December 2, 2009, as US 842, AL 21, with Thomas Kaufmann as nominator.1 Kaufmann is both an author and a preservationist.2 In an opinion column, he says probably fewer than 75 historic lookouts still stand in Alabama.2 He describes many of them as unsafe and illegal to climb.2

The register lists the Alabama Forestry Commission as administrator.1 We found no source on public access to the tower or on its condition today, so ask the Forestry Commission before going near it, and do not climb it.

  1. Beauregard Lookout Tower, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/al/beauregard-lookout-tower/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Thomas Kaufmann: Keeping Alabama's historic lookout towers, 1819 News, https://1819news.com/news/item/thomas-kaufmann-keeping-alabamas-historic-lookout-towers (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Photo of Beauregard Lookout Tower
Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source

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Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, type, what it is built of, status, register numbers, agency, dates, photos, links National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  2. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, agency, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story

More about this lookout elsewhere

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.