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Fire lookout · Valley County, Idaho

Miners Peak Lookout

A 1948 L-4 cab moved from Teapot Dome; the two-story cab that stands today is dated 1983 or 1986, staffed in fire season, hike-in.

Visit & stay

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

Access

Access unknown

We do not know the access rules. Check with the land manager before you go.

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
No, you have to hike
Trail
Listed as hike-in on Idaho Fire Lookouts. No public climbing rule found in the sources.
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Two-story buildingTwo-story cab on the 1948 L-4 site. NHLR says wood frame; Firelookout.com says log hip-roofed; Idaho Fire Lookouts says R-4 log cabThe design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Built
1986
Height
Unknown
Elevation
7,805 ft (2,379 m)
Agency
US Forest Service - Payette National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Valley County, Idaho
Coordinates
44.86853, −115.77361
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-miners-peak

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.

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. 1948 MovedL-4 gable-roofed cab moved from Teapot Dome lookout to establish the Miners Peak siteSources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  2. No record between 1948 and 1974
  3. 1974 Replaced by a new structureR-6 flat cab replaced the L-4 (Idaho Fire Lookouts only)Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  4. 1983 Replaced by a new structureIdaho Fire Lookouts dates the R-4 two-story log cab to 1983; NHLR and Firelookout.com give 1986Source: idahofirelookouts.com
  5. 1986 BuiltTwo-story cab built, per NHLR and Firelookout.comSources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com
  6. No record between 1986 and 2020
  7. 2020 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered on the National Historic Lookout Register, October 2, 2020Source: nhlr.org
  8. 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 8 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Miners Peak sits at about 7,800 feet in Valley County, on the Payette National Forest.1,2 The site was first set up in 1948, when a gable-roofed L-4 cabin was moved there from the Teapot Dome lookout to serve as a lookout.1,3,2 The tower that stands today is a two-story cab, and the sources disagree about when it went up.1,3,2 The National Historic Lookout Register and Firelookout.com both give 1986,1,3 while Idaho Fire Lookouts gives 1983 and adds a 1974 flat cab that replaced the original L-4 in between.2 The register calls the new building a wood frame lookout, while Firelookout.com calls the cab log, so its material is not settled either.1,3

The register says the tower is usually staffed in fire season.1 Firelookout.com says someone mans it in summer,3 and Idaho Fire Lookouts says it is manned now to detect fires.2 That site also keeps a short list of known staff, running from 1961 to 1962 and then through 2026 with a handful of names across the decades.2 It asks readers to say who staffed the tower, or when.2 A reader comment on the Idaho Fire Lookouts page, from a former staffer who says they were on Miners Peak in summer 1961, mentions a big fire on the South Fork that blew up.2 The comment does not name the fire or say whether it was seen from the tower, so I cannot say whether the tower has a notable fire.

Nothing in the three sources describes the tower as removed, burned or closed. All three describe it as a working lookout that is staffed in season, which means it still stands.1,3,2 The register lists its registration date as October 2, 2020.1

Idaho Fire Lookouts tags Miners Peak as a hike-in lookout.2 None of the sources gives a public climbing rule. Because the tower is staffed in fire season, check with the Payette National Forest before you plan a visit.

  1. Miners Peak Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/id/miners-peak-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  2. Miners Peak, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/west-central/miners-peak/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  3. Miners Peak Fire Lookout Tower, Firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/minerspeak.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩

Photos

Miners Peak Lookout - 2013
Miners Peak Lookout - 2013 (2013)Photo: Sharon Prow, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Miners Peak L.O.
Miners Peak L.OPhoto: Mark Schreiter, via firelookout.com · source

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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, 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: 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. 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
  6. 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.