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Fire lookout · Clearwater County, Idaho

Armstrong Peak Lookout

Clearwater County, Idaho pole lookout on Armstrong Peak, built 1934 and rebuilt 1953; gone since 1962, when sources disagree on removal versus destruction.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Gone since 1962; sources differ on whether it was removed or destroyed

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?
Yes, you can drive up

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a tower60-foot pole tower with L-6 cab and cabinThe design: L-6
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1934
Height
60 ft (18.3 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Clearwater-Potlatch Timber Protective Association
Land
Unknown
Location
Clearwater County, Idaho
Coordinates
46.80382, −115.89515
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-armstrong-peak

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 3.8 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. 1934 Built60-foot pole tower with L-6 cab and cabinSource: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  2. No record between 1934 and 1953
  3. 1953 RebuiltAssociation 1953 annual report says the tower was completely rebuilt that yearSource: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1962 Destroyedfirelookout.com and Idaho Fire Lookouts list it as destroyed in 1962Sources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  5. 1962 RemovedAssociation combined 1961-62 report says it was removed in the fall after the fire seasonSource: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  6. 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 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Armstrong Peak sits about 14 miles east of Elk River in Clearwater County, Idaho, at an elevation of 3,555 feet.1 The tower went up in 1934 as a 60-foot pole tower with an L-6 cab and a cabin.2 The Forest Lookouts site files it under the Clearwater-Potlatch Timber Protective Association.2

The association's 1953 annual report says the tower was completely rebuilt that year, and that other towers received minor repairs.2

The combined 1961–62 report says the tower had not been used for several years and was in poor condition, and that it was removed that autumn, once fire season was over.2 The same entry also mentions improved detection methods.2 Two other listings say instead that it was destroyed in 1962, so the sources disagree on whether it was taken down or destroyed.1,3

Idaho Fire Lookouts tags the site as drive-up.3 None of the sources we read describes what, if anything, remains on the peak today, or whether visitors may go there.

  1. Armstrong Peak Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/armstrongpeak.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Armstrong Peak, Forest Lookouts, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/armstrong-peak.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Armstrong Peak Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/st-joe-clearwater-region/armstrong-peak-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Sources

  1. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: name, location, county, type, status, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  2. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  3. Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) Gave us: dates, links idahofirelookouts.com · No licence stated; facts only (coordinates, status/built/destroyed year parsed from each entry's short excerpt). Thumbnail photos mirrored with credit per the project's photo policy. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  4. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: design, height, agency, 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, height, status, agency, 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.