Fire lookout · Idaho County, Idaho
Free Use Point Lookout
Idaho County, Idaho lookout on the Nez Perce National Forest: a 20-foot pole L-4 tower, built 1931 or 1934 (sources differ), destroyed 1953. Site today undocumented.
- Gone
- Access unknown
- Verified
Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1953; no source describes what remains at the site.
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
Facts
- Status
- Type
- Cab on a tower20-foot pole tower with an L-4 cabThe design: L-4
- Built of
- Not recorded
- Built
- 1931
- Height
- 20 ft (6.1 m)
- Elevation
- Unknown
- Agency
- Nez Perce National Forest
- Land
- Unknown
- Location
- Idaho County, Idaho
- Coordinates
- 45.74314, −116.15238
- Registers
- Not on a lookout register
- This entry
- VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
- Firefinder id
us-id-free-use-point
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 3.6 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
- 1931 Builtfirelookout.com: 20-foot pole L-4 tower; idahofirelookouts.com gives 1934 for the L-4 cabSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
- 1934 Eventidahofirelookouts.com lists an L-4 cab on a 20-foot pole towerSource: idahofirelookouts.com
- No record between 1934 and 1953
- 1953 DestroyedSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
- 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 (opens another site) (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).
Story
Researched 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.
Free Use Point lies about 12 miles south of Grangeville, in Idaho County, Idaho, on the Nez Perce National Forest, at 5,003 feet.1,2
The two sources disagree on the build year.1,2 firelookout.com dates the 20-foot pole tower to 1931.1 Idaho Fire Lookouts dates its L-4 cab to 1934.2 Both give 1953 as the year the lookout was destroyed.1,2 The photo on the firelookout.com page is credited to the Nez Perce National Forest.1
No source I could find describes what remains at the point today. A recreation listing places the point inside the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forests, classes it as a rest area, and mentions no tower.3
- Free Use Point Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/freeusepoint.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
- Free Use Point Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/selway-region/free-use-point-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
- Free Use Point, Komoot, https://www.komoot.com/highlight/7814818 (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
Photos
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
- Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists (opens another site) 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
- firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page (opens another site) 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
- Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) (opens another site) 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
- Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, 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
- Free Use Point (Komoot) (opens another site)
- FFLA Idaho lookout list (firelookout.org) (opens another site)
- Free Use Point on firelookout.com (Rex Kamstra) (opens another site)
- Free Use Point Lookout on idahofirelookouts.com (opens another site)
Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.