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Fire lookout · Boundary County, Idaho

Cutoff Peak Lookout

Boundary County, ID lookout on Kaniksu NF land: 1937 tower and log cabin; tower removed or destroyed, log ground cabin remains in poor shape.

Ruins: Only footings or remains are left. Tower removed or destroyed; the log ground cabin remains in poor condition, with footings and debris from the tower on the site

Visit & stay

Ruins: footings or remains only. There is no structure 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?
No, you have to hike
Trail
Idaho Fire Lookouts labels the site a hike-in. No source says whether it is open to visitors today; the cabin is in poor condition.

Facts

Status
Ruins
Type
Cab on a towerLog ground cabin with a tower; sources disagree on the cab (L-6 per firelookout.com, L-4 per Idaho Fire Lookouts)The designs: L-4, L-6
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1937
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Kaniksu National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Boundary County, Idaho
Coordinates
48.88005, −116.65596
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-cutoff-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 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. 1932 StaffedWilliam Edwards listed as lookout; predates the 1937 date given for the towerSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  2. 1937 BuiltL-6 tower with log cabin, per firelookout.com; Idaho Fire Lookouts describes an L-4 cab tower on a log ground cabinSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  3. 1946 StaffedJohn LaFleur listed as lookoutSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  4. 1947 StaffedJ.D. Hughes listed as lookoutSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  5. 1949 StaffedCharles Littlefield listed as lookout for 1949-1950Sources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  6. TodayRuinsOnly footings or remains are left. When it came down is not recorded.

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.

Cutoff Peak Lookout sits at an elevation of 6,844 feet.1,2 It stands on the Kaniksu National Forest in Boundary County, Idaho, about 11 miles southwest of Porthill.1,3

The lookout combined a log ground cabin with a tower.2 Firelookout.com dates the tower to 1937 and gives it an L-6 design, while Idaho Fire Lookouts describes an L-4 cab on the tower.1,2 The two pages disagree on the cab type.

The earliest name listed is William Edwards, in 1932, five years before the 1937 date given for the tower.1,2 The sources do not explain that gap. Later names are John LaFleur (1946), J.D. Hughes (1947), and Charles Littlefield (1949 to 1950).1,2

Idaho Fire Lookouts says the lookout was abandoned in the 1960s, and that the tower was removed or destroyed while the log ground cabin remains.2 Firelookout.com agrees on the basics: the tower is gone and the cabin is still there.1 A 2011 regional article still lists towers and log cabins on Cutoff Peak, which conflicts with the later visit report.4

A visit reported in a September 2021 post found the cabin in poor shape. The writers say one side is badly run down and doubt the cabin has many winters left.2 Footings, debris and burnt wooden tower legs remain on the site.2

Idaho Fire Lookouts labels the site a hike-in.2 No source we read says whether it is open to visitors today, and given the cabin's condition, people should stay out of it.

  1. Cutoff Peak Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/cutoffpeak.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Cutoff Peak Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/northern-idaho/cutoff-peak-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Cutoff Peak - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Forest Lookouts (Idaho), https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/cutoff-peak.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Fire Lookouts of Boundary County, Idaho, Naturally North Idaho, https://www.naturallynorthidaho.com/2011/03/fire-lookouts-of-boundary-county-idaho.htm (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: 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.