FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Idaho

Capitol Hill Lookout

Coeur d'Alene National Forest lookout: a 40-foot pole L-4 tower built in 1936 and destroyed in 1960; a 2024 visit found only footings and two benchmarks.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1960. A 2024 visit found the footings and two benchmarks, and the writers saw nothing else.

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
Type unknown40-foot pole L-4 towerThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1936
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Coeur d'Alene National Forest
Land
Unknown
Location
Idaho
Coordinates
47.52854, −115.94905
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-capitol-hill-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 a typical height for a lookout like it.

Downloads about 3.3 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 EventA camp was located on the siteSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  2. 1936 Built40-foot pole L-4 towerSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  3. 1937 StaffedJay Murray, named on the Idaho Fire Lookouts pageSource: idahofirelookouts.com
  4. 1946 StaffedMr. and Mrs. Clyde PeacockSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  5. 1960 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.

Capitol Hill sits in the Coeur d'Alene National Forest, six miles north-northwest of Wallace in Shoshone County, Idaho, at an elevation of 5,318 feet.1 A camp was located on the site in 1930.1,2 A 40-foot pole L-4 tower went up in 1936.1,2

The Idaho Fire Lookouts page names Jay Murray for 1937 and Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Peacock for 1946.2 Firelookout.com names only the Peacocks, also for 1946.1

Both sites give 1960 as the year the tower was destroyed.1,2

A post on the Idaho Fire Lookouts site, dated July 3, 2024, describes a visit that found the tower's footings and two benchmarks.2 The writers say nothing else seems to remain beyond those, and that trees have grown up so thickly around the site that its view has been lost.2

Neither cited page describes the site after that visit.1,2 The writers call the drive up an easy one and say they met other visitors on the roads.2 The cited pages do not say whether the site is open to the public.1,2

  1. Capitol Hill Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/capitolhill.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Capitol Hill Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/cda-region/capitol-hill-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Photos

Capitol Hill Lookout
Capitol Hill LookoutPhoto: idahofirelookouts.com · 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. Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) Gave us: name, location, status, 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
  2. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, 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.