FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Clearwater County, Idaho

Boehls Butte

Clearwater County tower near Elk River: a 40-foot L-4 pole tower from 1934, rebuilt in 1953, destroyed in 1972. No current description found.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1972; no source describes what remains at the site.

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
Trail
Listed as drive-up by Idaho Fire Lookouts; no source says whether the land is open to visitors.

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a tower40-foot pole tower with L-4 cabThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1934
Height
40 ft (12.2 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Potlatch Timber Protective Association
Land
Unknown
Location
Clearwater County, Idaho
Coordinates
46.59890, −115.79500
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-boehls-butte-2

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 3.7 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 Built40-foot pole tower with L-4 cabSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  2. No record between 1934 and 1953
  3. 1953 RebuiltTower completely rebuilt, per the association's annual reportSource: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  4. No record between 1953 and 1972
  5. 1972 DestroyedTower destroyedSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.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.

Boehls Butte is a former lookout in Clearwater County, about 10 miles northeast of Elk River, at an elevation of 3,610 feet.1,2

The Forest Lookouts list gives the Potlatch Timber Protective Association as the agency.3

A 40-foot pole tower with an L-4 cab went up in 1934.1,2 A 1953 annual report of the association, quoted on the Forest Lookouts list, says the tower was entirely rebuilt that year.3 The tower was destroyed in 1972.1,2

Idaho Fire Lookouts marks the site as drive-up.2 No source describes what remains at the site today, and none says whether the land is open to visitors.

  1. Boehls Butte Fire Lookout Tower, Fire Lookout, https://firelookout.com/id/boehlsbutte.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Boehls Butte Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/st-joe-clearwater-region/boehls-butte-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Boehls Butte, Forest Lookouts, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/boehls-butte.html (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. 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.