FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Itasca County, Minnesota

Dixon Lake

Itasca County, MN 100-ft stairway tower on the Chippewa NF; a CCC camp erected it (1936 per one list); sold and removed in the 1972 tower sale.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.

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
Gone
Type
Cab on a tower100-foot Aermotor stairway towerThe design: Aermotor
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1936
Height
100 ft (30.5 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Chippewa National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Itasca County, Minnesota
Coordinates
47.62821, −94.29131
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-mn-dixon-lake

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 4.0 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. 1936 BuiltErected by a CCC camp, per A-Z list; the list's table gives 1937Source: upload.wikimedia.org
  2. No record between 1936 and 1972
  3. 1972 EventBids opened June 8, 1972 for the sale of the towerSource: centraluslookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1972 RemovedSold and removed in the 1972 Chippewa National Forest tower saleSource: upload.wikimedia.org
  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 (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Forest Fire Lookout Association's list of Minnesota lookouts marks the Dixon Lake tower as gone.1 The Central US Lookouts page names the Chippewa National Forest as the agency for the Itasca County site.2

An A-Z list of Minnesota towers describes it as a 100-foot Aermotor stairway lookout and says a Civilian Conservation Corps camp erected it in 1936.3 The same list gives 1937 in its table, so the list disagrees with itself on the year.3

The tower was offered for sale in 1972.2 The Central US page records that bids were opened on June 8, 1972, and says airplane patrols had proven better than a tower.2 The A-Z list says it was sold and removed in the 1972 Chippewa National Forest tower sale.3

No source describes what, if anything, remains at the site today, or whether the ground is open to visitors. The list's only mention of the surroundings is that the road by the site is named 3rd River 1.3

  1. Minnesota Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/mn/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Dixon Lake - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Central US Lookouts, https://centraluslookouts.weebly.com/dixon-lake.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. A-Z List of Towers (PDF), Wikimedia Commons, https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/A-Z_List-Towers.pdf (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

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. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- central US (centraluslookouts.weebly.com) Gave us: agency, ownership, links centraluslookouts.weebly.com · No licence stated; facts only (county, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, status, height, design hints, register links). The site's own historical quotes, newspaper citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. 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

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.