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Fire lookout · Idaho County, Idaho

Elkhorn Mountain Lookout

A 1933 L-4 cab replaced in 1959 by an R-6 flat cab on a 10-ft concrete base in the Bitterroot forest; named lookouts 1959-1980; destroyed in 1991.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1991; no source describes what remains.

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?
Unknown
Trail
Hike-in site, per Idaho Fire Lookouts

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Two-story buildingR-6 flat cab on a 10-ft concrete base (1959), replacing a 1933 L-4 cabThe designs: L-4, R-6
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Built
1933
Height
10 ft (3.0 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Bitterroot National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Idaho County, Idaho
Coordinates
45.48344, −114.88141
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-elkhorn-mountain

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. 1933 BuiltL-4 cabSources: firelookout.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  2. No record between 1933 and 1959
  3. 1959 Replaced by a new structureR-6 flat cab on a 10-ft concrete base; the Forest Lookouts page dates a cinder-block base and cab to 1957Sources: firelookout.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1959 First staffedMichael Long, the first named lookout in the sourcesSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  5. No record between 1959 and 1980
  6. 1980 Last staffedLast named lookout in the Idaho Fire Lookouts listSource: idahofirelookouts.com
  7. 1991 DestroyedDestroyedSources: firelookout.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  8. 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.

The Elkhorn Mountain lookout stood at 7,907 feet in Idaho County, 17 miles south-southwest of Magruder Ranger Station, in the Bitterroot National Forest.1

The first cab was an L-4, built in 1933.1,2 In 1959 an R-6 flat cab on a 10-foot concrete base replaced it.1 The Forest Lookouts page dates a 10-foot cinder-block base and an R-6 cab to 1957, built by Dave Langley and a crew of two, with materials packed in from the Salmon Mountain base camp.2 The sources disagree on the year and on the base material.

Named lookouts run from 1959 to 1980.1,3 Michael Long is listed for 1959, and Dave Garner for the early 1960s.1,3 A 1963 Ravalli Republic item calls the coming season his third.2

In 1969 a Ravalli Republic item said Scott Keating, a Gonzaga engineering student, would man the lookout.2 The last name in the Idaho list is Alexia Cochrane, for 1980.3

The lookout was destroyed in 1991.1,2

No source describes what, if anything, remains at the site.1,3,2 Idaho Fire Lookouts lists it as a hike-in site.3 No source says whether it is open to visitors.1,3,2

  1. Elkhorn Mtn. Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/elkhorn.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Elkhorn Mountain - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Forest Lookouts, Idaho, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/elkhorn-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Elkhorn Mountain Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/selway-region/elkhorn-mountain-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Photos

Elkhorn Mountain Lookout
Elkhorn Mountain 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: 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: what it is built of, design, height, 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, 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.