FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Santa Cruz County, Arizona

Atascosa Lookout

Also known as Atascosa Lookout House, Atascosa Mountain

Coronado NF 14x14 ft L-4 groundhouse built 1930-33 on Atascosa Mountain, AZ; NRHP 1988, NHLR 1996; destroyed by the Murphy Fire in June 2011.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in June 2011: NHLR and KOLD name the Murphy Fire; Wikipedia gives June 6 without naming the fire; a Forest Lookouts page gives June 5 and says the lookout and outhouse were destroyed. No source describes the stone cistern or the site now.

Visit & stay

Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent.

Access

Access unknown

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

Road to the top?
Unknown
Trail
A 1989 survey said the lookout was accessible by trail only. No source describes access to the site now.

Facts

Status
Gone sources disagree
Type
Ground-level cabL-4 type wooden groundhouse, 14 by 14 feet, modified hip roof with 2-foot overhangThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1930
Height
12 ft (3.7 m)
Elevation
6,070 ft (1,850 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service (Coronado National Forest)
Land
Federal land
Location
Santa Cruz County, Arizona
Coordinates
31.42068, −111.14671
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-az-atascosa

View from the cab

What the lookout saw from its 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.

This lookout is gone. The view is reconstructed from its recorded site and its recorded height.

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

  1. 1930 BuiltBuilt between 1930 and 1933 per NHLR and Wikipedia; the 1989 survey says erected in 1930 or 1933Sources: nhlr.org, en.wikipedia.org, westlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1933 BuiltAssociated outhouse and stone cistern builtSource: westlookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1944 FireBlaze reported by the lookout on Atascosa Peak; center and landowner unclear in the reportSource: westlookouts.weebly.com
  4. No record between 1944 and 1967
  5. 1967 StaffedDorothy Williams worked alone as lookout, per a Tucson newspaper item quoted on the westlookouts pageSource: westlookouts.weebly.com
  6. No record between 1967 and 1988
  7. 1988 Listed on the National Register of Historic PlacesAdded to the National Register of Historic Places; NRIS record date 1/28/1988Sources: en.wikipedia.org, npgallery.nps.gov
  8. 1989 EventNo longer used for fire detection; a rest area for hikers, reachable by trail only (1989 regional survey)Source: westlookouts.weebly.com
  9. 1996 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered December 30, 1996 as US 201, AZ 8Source: nhlr.org
  10. 1999 AlteredRenovated between 1999 and 2001 (KOLD)Source: kold.com
  11. 2011 DestroyedDestroyed in the Murphy Fire per NHLR and KOLD, June 6, 2011 (Wikipedia gives the same date without naming the fire); the westlookouts page gives June 5 and says the outhouse was also destroyedSources: nhlr.org, en.wikipedia.org, westlookouts.weebly.com
  12. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.

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.

Atascosa Lookout stood on Atascosa Mountain in the Coronado National Forest, about 25 miles west of Nogales and four miles north of the border.1

The Forest Service built it between 1930 and 1933 as a 14-by-14-foot wooden groundhouse with a modified hip roof.2,3,1 A 1989 regional survey gives the year as 1930 or 1933.1 The outhouse and a stone cistern were built in 1933, and gutters on the roof fed rainwater into the cistern.2,1

In June 1944 the lookout on Atascosa Peak reported a blaze.1 The center of the fire could not be located, and it was unclear whose land it was burning on.1 In 1967 Dorothy Williams worked alone there in a lookout that a Tucson newspaper described as 12 by 12 feet.1 According to the paper, she was the only woman doing this job alone in the Coronado National Forest.1

The lookout was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.3,4 The National Historic Lookout Register listed it on December 30, 1996.2

By 1989 it was no longer used for fire detection.1 That year's regional survey described it as a rest area for hikers, reachable only by trail.1

The register says the Murphy Fire destroyed it on June 6, 2011, and Wikipedia gives the same date.2,3 A lookout history page gives June 5 instead.1 KOLD News 13 reported that the lookout had been renovated between 1999 and 2001 and had large windows and a porch.5

The Forest Lookouts page says the fire also destroyed the outhouse, but none of the sources checked says whether the stone cistern survived, or whether the site is open to visitors now.1,5

  1. Atascosa Mountain, Forest Lookouts, https://westlookouts.weebly.com/atascosa-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Atascosa Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/az/atascosa-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Atascosa Lookout House, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atascosa_Lookout_House (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Atascosa Lookout House, National Park Service NPGallery, https://npgallery.nps.gov/AssetDetail/NRIS/87002462 (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  5. Historic Atascosa Lookout burns in wildfire, KOLD News 13, https://www.kold.com/story/14868364/hiostoric/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

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

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Where sources disagree

We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.

  • Sources disagree on whether it still stands.

    • FFLA: Gone
    • NHLR: Standing
    • Wikidata: Gone

    NHLR lists lookouts that were standing when registered.

Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, elevation, register numbers, agency, ownership, 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. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: county, type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. Wikidata -- US fire lookout towers (Q748998 and subclasses) Gave us: register numbers, dates, links Wikidata · CC0 1.0 (Wikidata). Images keep their own Commons licence/credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  4. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: height, links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  5. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, staffing, visiting details, 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.