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Fire lookout · Valley County, Idaho

Short Creek Lookout

Frank Church wilderness lookout: 1930 log cabin, 1934 L-4 cab, abandoned in the 1950s; the 1930-1934 dates and a 1963 staffing item conflict.

Visit & stay

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

Access

Restricted access

Access is seasonal, gated or needs a permit. Check before you go. Abandoned site inside the Frank Church wilderness, reached on foot. No source describes public entry into the cabin.

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
No, you have to hike
Trail
Spur trail #6062 is 1.0 mile long, from the Bernard Trail and Paradise Creek Trail. Cellphone service is usually unavailable.
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing sources disagree
Type
Ground-level cabL-4The design: L-4
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Height
Unknown
Elevation
7,861 ft (2,396 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service, Salmon-Challis National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Valley County, Idaho
Coordinates
45.01061, −114.77809
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-id-short-creek

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 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

  1. 1930 BuiltFirst structure was a log cabin, per firelookout.com, Idaho Fire Lookouts and Forest Lookouts. NHLR does not mention it.Sources: firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com, idaholookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1932 EventNewspaper item quoted by Forest Lookouts says a man was leaving to build a lookout house at Short Creek in August 1932. The item does not say the house was finished.Source: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1934 BuiltL-4 cab, per NHLR, firelookout.com, Idaho Fire Lookouts and Forest Lookouts.Sources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  4. No record between 1934 and 1950
  5. 1950 AbandonedAbandoned in the 1950s; 1950 marks the decade start only.Sources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com, idahofirelookouts.com
  6. 1951 StaffedFrank Hutchison of Salmon manned the lookout, per a July 1951 item quoted by Forest Lookouts.Source: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  7. 1963 StaffedPlanned staffing: Gregory Mayne of Los Angeles would be the Short Creek lookout, per a June 1963 item quoted by Forest Lookouts.Source: idaholookouts.weebly.com
  8. No record between 1963 and 2011
  9. 2011 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered September 26, 2011 as US 933, ID 92.Source: nhlr.org
  10. 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.

Short Creek sits in the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness in Valley County, Idaho, on Salmon-Challis National Forest land.1,2,3 Three sources date a first log cabin on the site to 1930, and firelookout.com says it is still there.2,4,5 An August 1932 item, quoted by Forest Lookouts from The Recorder Herald, reports that Perry Black set out for Short Creek to work on a lookout house.5 All four sources date the L-4 cab to 1934.1,2,4,5

The Forest Lookouts page quotes a July 1951 item naming Frank Hutchison of Salmon as the lookout's staffer.5 A June 1963 item on the same page reports that Gregory Mayne of Los Angeles was slated to staff the lookout.5 Idaho Fire Lookouts has no documented staffing history for the site.4

The register, firelookout.com and Idaho Fire Lookouts all say the L-4 cab was abandoned in the 1950s.1,2,4 The 1963 item does not fit that date, so the sources disagree.5 The register added the site on September 26, 2011, and calls it an orphan wilderness lookout that could use a friend.1

Access is on foot. Idaho Fire Lookouts lists the site as hike-in and abandoned.4 A Forest Service page describes a 1.0-mile spur trail that begins where the Bernard Trail and Paradise Creek Trail meet and ends at the lookout.3 The same page places the trail inside the wilderness and says phone coverage is usually absent there and help is not easy to reach.3 No source describes public entry into the cabin, so check with the Salmon-Challis National Forest about its condition before you go.4,3

  1. Short Creek Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/id/short-creek-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  2. Short Creek Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/id/shortcreek.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  3. Short Cr. Lookout Spur Trail #6062, Salmon-Challis National Forest, U.S. Forest Service, https://www.fs.usda.gov/r04/salmon-challis/recreation/trails/short-cr-lookout-spur-trail-6062 (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  4. Short Creek Lookout, Idaho Fire Lookouts, https://www.idahofirelookouts.com/west-central/short-creek-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  5. Short Creek, Forest Lookouts, https://idaholookouts.weebly.com/short-creek.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩

Photos

Photo of Short Creek Lookout
Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Photo of Short Creek Lookout
Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Lookout interior
Lookout interiorPhoto: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Short Creek in 1940
Short Creek in 1940 (1940)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Luke Channer, via firelookout.com · source
Short Creek in 2011
Short Creek in 2011 (2011)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Luke Channer, via firelookout.com · source
Short Creek in 2011
Short Creek in 2011 (2011)Photo: the Fire Lookout Museum and Luke Channer, via firelookout.com · source
Short Creek Lookout
Short Creek LookoutPhoto: idahofirelookouts.com · source

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.

Where sources disagree

We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.

  • Sources disagree on whether it still stands.

    • FFLA: Standing
    • NHLR: Standing
    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: Standing
    • Idaho Fire Lookouts (idahofirelookouts.com): Gone

    NHLR lists lookouts that were standing when registered. idahofirelookouts.com's status is read from a short summary.

  • Sources disagree on the year it was built.

    • NHLR: 1934
    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 1930

    Sources give different build years. Often one counts the first lookout on the site and another the structure there now.

Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, 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: what it is built of, 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: 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
  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, access, 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.