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Fire lookout · San Luis Obispo County, California

Black Mountain Lookout (San Luis Obispo County)

Also known as Black Mountain

Los Padres peak lookout: a CL-100 cab on an 11-foot block tower built 1964; the cab moved to Smith Mountain in 1976 and the tower is now marked removed.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. The cab was moved to Smith Mountain; a photo caption marks the 11-foot block tower as now removed.

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

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Two-story buildingCL-100 cab on an 11-foot block towerThe design: CL-100
Built of
SteelGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Built
1964
Height
11 ft (3.4 m)
Elevation
3,624 ft (1,105 m)
Agency
US Forest Service - Los Padres National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
San Luis Obispo County, California
Coordinates
35.39254, −120.35204
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-ca-black-mountain-san-luis-obispo-county

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. 1954 StaffedMrs. C. C. Yates served as fire ranger at the station since May 28 of that year (clipping dated November 26, 1954).Source: californialookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1964 BuiltCL-100 cab on an 11-foot block tower; the register also shows an earlier BC-301 cabin with an AWS residence.Source: firetower.org
  3. 1976 MovedCL-100 cab moved from Black Mountain to Smith Mountain and placed on a 10-foot block tower by CalFire.Source: nhlr.org
  4. No record between 1976 and 2019
  5. 2019 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: December 22, 2019Source: FFLOS register entry
  6. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. When it came down is not recorded.

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.

Black Mountain sits in the Los Padres National Forest, north of Pozo in San Luis Obispo County.1,2

A lookout stood on the peak before the present one.1 A photo caption on the register page names a "Previous BC-301 Cabin with AWS Residence."1 A 1954 newspaper item reported that Mrs. C. C. Yates was serving as fire ranger at the Forest Service lookout station there, on duty since May 28 of that year.2

The present cabin was built in 1964.1 It was a CL-100 cab on an 11-foot block tower.1 According to the register, the cabin went to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection and was taken to Smith Mountain in Monterey County, where it still stands.1 The Smith Mountain register entry gives the move as 1976, when CalFire placed the cab on a 10-foot block tower there.3

The clippings page says the cab was removed and its base was used to house equipment. It gives no date for this.2 A photo caption that mentions 2009 marks the 11-foot block tower as "Now Removed."1 No source I found describes the summit as it is now beyond these notes.

  1. Black Mountain Lookout (San Luis Obispo County), Former Fire Lookout Sites, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/ca/black-mountain-lookout-san-luis-obispo-county/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Black Mountain, Forest Lookouts (California) clippings, californialookouts.weebly.com, https://californialookouts.weebly.com/black-mountain3.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Smith Mountain Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/ca/smith-mountain-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Black Mountain Lookout - Previous BC-301 Cabin with AWS Residence
Black Mountain Lookout - Previous BC-301 Cabin with AWS ResidencePhoto: USFS - Craig R. Carey Collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
11 Foot Block Tower For 1964 Built CL-100 Cabin In 2009 - Now Removed
11 Foot Block Tower For 1964 Built CL-100 Cabin In 2009 - Now Removed (1964)Photo: Ron Kemnow, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source

Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, photos, links Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.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: 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. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: 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
  4. 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

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