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Fire lookout · Boundary County, Idaho

Camels Prairie Lookout

Kaniksu National Forest tower built in 1934 as a 40-foot pole with an L-4 cab after a 1931 camp, destroyed in 1962; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1962; the Forest Fire Lookout Association lists the tower as gone.

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 tower40-foot pole tower with L-4 cabThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1934
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Kaniksu National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Boundary County, Idaho
Coordinates
48.53987, −116.75259
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-camels-prairie

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 a typical height for a lookout like it.

Downloads about 4.2 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. 1931 EventCamp established at the siteSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  2. 1934 Built40-foot pole tower with L-4 cabSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  3. No record between 1934 and 1950
  4. 1950 StaffedBob Bond listed as known staff; photo captioned 1950 (Gary Weber collection)Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  5. 1956 StaffedRyder Chronic listed as known staff; photo captioned 1956Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  6. 1962 DestroyedSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  7. 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.

Camels Prairie sits in Boundary County, Idaho, about six miles northeast of Coolin, in the Kaniksu National Forest.1,2 A camp was set up there in 1931.1,3 A 40-foot pole tower with an L-4 cab followed in 1934.1,3

Idaho Fire Lookouts lists two known staff at the site: Bob Bond, with a photo captioned 1950, and Ryder Chronic, with a photo captioned 1956.3

The tower was destroyed in 1962.1,3 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's list marks the tower as gone.4 One regional guide labels the site drive-up.3

No source I found describes what remains at the site today, or whether the land is open to visitors.

  1. Camels Prairie Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/camelsprairie.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Camels Prairie - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Idaho Forest Lookouts, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/camels-prairie.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Camels Prairie Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/northern-idaho/camels-prairie-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Idaho Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/id (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Photos

Camels Prairie Lookout
Camels Prairie LookoutPhoto: idahofirelookouts.com · source

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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, photos, 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: agency, ownership, 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.