Fire lookout · Shoshone County, Idaho

Indian Dip (Joker)

Also known as Indian Dip (Joker Point)

Shoshone County camp (c.1927), L-4 cab atop the north summit in 1931, destroyed 1957; a Brush Hill patrol tower is labeled ruins.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1957. The Brush Hill patrol tower is labeled ruins. No source describes the Dip site today.

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
Trail
Idaho Fire Lookouts tags the entry 'Drive-Up Destroyed'. No source describes the site today.

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Ground-level cabL-4 cab atop the north summit (1931)The design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1931
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
St. Joe National Forest
Land
Unknown
Location
Shoshone County, Idaho
Coordinates
46.96633, −115.72800
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-indian-dip-joker

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 4.1 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. 1927 EventCamp, c.1927. No structure is named.Sources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1931 BuiltL-4 cab atop the north summitSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  3. No record between 1931 and 1957
  4. 1957 DestroyedDestroyedSources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  5. 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.

Indian Dip, also listed as Joker Point, lies in Shoshone County, Idaho, on the St. Joe National Forest, at an elevation of 5,710 feet.1,2 It is about 19 miles west-southwest of the Red Ives Ranger Station.1

The site began as a camp around 1927.1,2,3 In 1931 an L-4 cab went up atop the north summit.1,2,3 The lookout was destroyed in 1957.1,2,3 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's list gives the kind as "Ground" and the status as "Gone."4

A patrol point 2.5 miles north, atop Brush Hill, carried a 15-foot L-6 tower.1,2 The firelookout.com page labels that patrol tower "Ruins."1

Idaho Fire Lookouts tags the entry "Drive-Up Destroyed."2 We found no source describing what, if anything, remains at the Dip site today, or whether the site is open to visitors.

  1. Indian Dip (Joker Point) Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/indiandip.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Indian Dip (Joker Point), Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/st-joe-clearwater-region/indian-dip-joker-point/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Shoshone County, Forest Lookouts, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/shoshone-county.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Idaho Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/id (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Sources

  1. 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
  2. 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
  3. Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com) (opens another site) Gave us: dates, 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. 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.