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Fire lookout · Idaho County, Idaho

Corral Hill Lookout

A 1929 pole tower on the Nez Perce National Forest was replaced in 1953 by the current L-4 cab, which has returned to full summer staffing since the 2000s.

Visit & stay

Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.

Access

Restricted access

Access is seasonal, gated or needs a permit. Check before you go. Active staffed Forest Service lookout, not a public rental; not generally open for overnight stays.

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
Unknown
Staffing
Staffed during fire season (as of 2026)

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a towerL-4 cab, 41-foot treated timber tower with catwalkThe design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Height
40 ft (12.2 m)
Elevation
5,968 ft (1,819 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service (Nez Perce National Forest)
Land
Federal land
Location
Idaho County, Idaho
Coordinates
45.96417, −115.82278
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-corral-hill

View from the cab

What you see from the 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.

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Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1929 BuiltFirst structure: a 40-foot pole tower with a tent cabin at the base.Source: nhlr.org
  2. No record between 1929 and 1953
  3. 1953 Built'Built' field on NHLR detail pageSource: NHLR register entry
  4. 1953 Replaced by a new structureNez Perce National Forest built the current 41-foot L-4 timber tower with catwalk.Sources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com
  5. No record between 1953 and 1979
  6. 1979 StaffedStaffed by Bob Anderson.Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  7. 1987 StaffedStaffed by Aaron Lytle (per Fire Lookout Museum).Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  8. No record between 1987 and 2009
  9. 2009 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered on the National Historic Lookout Register, April 24, 2009, as US 783.Source: nhlr.org
  10. 2019 StaffedStaffed by Kevin Roach, 2019-2026 (Idaho Fire Lookouts staff list).Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  11. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

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 4 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Corral Hill got its start in 1929, when the Nez Perce National Forest put up a simple 40-foot pole tower with a tent cabin at its base so a lookout had somewhere to sleep.1 That arrangement lasted a couple of decades before the Forest Service replaced it in 1953 with the structure still standing today: a 41-foot treated timber tower carrying a standard L-4 cab and catwalk.1,2

The tower has had people in it on and off ever since. At some point in the 1970s it was dropped to emergency-use status rather than staffed every season, but it came back to regular summer staffing in the 2000s and has stayed active during fire season since.3 Among the named staff are Bob Anderson, who watched from Corral Hill in 1979 while a colleague named Kris worked nearby at Coolwater, and more recently Kevin Roach, a former wildland firefighter who took the job partly so he could have his kids with him for the summer.3 Writer Nancy Canyon also lived there in the early 1970s and later wrote about the experience in her book "Struck, A Season on a Fire Lookout."3

Corral Hill was added to the National Historic Lookout Register on April 24, 2009, as US 783.1 It sits at about 5,968 feet on the Nez Perce National Forest and remains an active Forest Service lookout rather than a rental, so the structure is not generally open for overnight stays the way some retired towers are.1,3 Visitors researching a trip should check current conditions and access with the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forests before heading up, since a staffed fire tower is still a working facility during the season.

  1. Corral Hill Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/id/corral-hill-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-04). ↩
  2. Corral Hill Lookout, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/corralhill.html (accessed 2026-10-04). ↩
  3. Corral Hill Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/selway-region/corral-hill-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-04). ↩

Photos

December 2020 photo
December 2020 photo (2020)Photo: Wyatt Griffis, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Photo of Corral Hill Lookout
Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Corral Hill in 1989
Corral Hill in 1989 (1989)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum, via firelookout.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.

Where sources disagree

We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.

  • Sources disagree on the year it was built.

    • NHLR: 1953
    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 1929

    Sources give different build years. Often one counts the first lookout on the site and another the structure there now.

Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, photos, links National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.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. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: design, height, photos, 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
  4. Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) Gave us: 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
  5. OpenStreetMap -- fire lookout structures Gave us: links © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0. (c) OpenStreetMap contributors. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  6. 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
  7. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, access, staffing, 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.