Fire lookout · Cleburne County, Alabama
Oak Grove Tower
1949 Aermotor MC-39 tower in Cleburne County, Alabama, ordered in 1948; NHLR-registered 2009. No post-2009 condition, staffing or access sources found.
- Standing
- Access unknown
- Verified
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
- Type
- Cab on a tower100-foot Aermotor MC-39 steel tower with 7 by 7 foot cabThe design: Aermotor MC-39
- Built of
- SteelGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
- Built
- 1949
- Height
- 100 ft (30.5 m)
- Elevation
- 1,308 ft (399 m)
- Agency
- Alabama Forestry Commission
- Land
- State land
- Location
- Cleburne County, Alabama
- Coordinates
- 33.69523, −85.45202
- Registers
- This entry
- VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
- Firefinder id
us-al-oak-grove
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 3.2 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
- 1948 EventForest Lookouts quotes a July 29, 1948 Anniston Star report: a 100-foot steel tower, tractor, truck and radio equipment ordered for the countySource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
- 1949 BuiltNHLR build year; 100-foot Aermotor MC-39 with 7x7 cabSource: nhlr.org
- No record between 1949 and 2009
- 2009 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered January 7, 2009 as US 860, AL 38; nominated by Thomas KaufmannSource: nhlr.org
- 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 (opens another site) (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).
Story
Researched 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.
Oak Grove Tower is a 100-foot Aermotor MC-39 steel lookout with a 7-by-7-foot cab, administered by the Alabama Forestry Commission.1 The Register dates it to 1949 and describes it as the one lookout the Alabama Forestry Commission has ever put up in Cleburne County, meant to work alongside four nearby Forest Service lookouts on the Talladega National Forest.1
A July 1948 Anniston Star report, as quoted on the Forest Lookouts website, said the state forestry division in Cleburne County had ordered a 100-foot steel tower, a tractor, a truck and radio equipment.2 Most of the $8,000 raised came from local sawmill and planing mill operators, and federal funds covered the rest.2 The county commissioners provided $1,000 a year to run the new equipment, and the tower was planned for a spot about four miles east of Edwardsville.2
The 1948 report calls the operator the state Division of Forestry, while the Register names the Alabama Forestry Commission. The sources do not say when the name changed.1,2
The Register says views into Georgia are possible from the cab.1 The sources I read do not name who staffed the tower or record any fires it helped fight.
The Register entry went in on January 7, 2009, and it describes the tower in the present tense.1 I found no later source about its condition, any move, or any removal.
Today I found no current access rules, visiting hours or rental offer for the tower. Because the Alabama Forestry Commission administers it, check with the agency before going to the site, and do not climb the tower unless its owner has said it is open.1
- Oak Grove Tower, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/al/oak-grove-tower/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
- Oak Grove, Forest Lookouts, quoting The Anniston Star, July 29, 1948, https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/oak-grove.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
Photos
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Sources
- National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) (opens another site) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, 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
- FOREST LOOKOUTS -- eastern US (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) (opens another site) Gave us: type, height, ownership, links easternuslookouts.weebly.com · No licence stated; facts only (county, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, status, height, design hints, register links). The site's own historical quotes, newspaper citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
- Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, 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
- NHLR register entry US 860 (nhlr.org) (opens another site)
- Oak Grove (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) (opens another site)
Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.