FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Perry County, Mississippi

Paret Lookout Tower

Perry County 100-ft steel Aermotor on the De Soto National Forest; the register credits a 1934 CCC build by a New Jersey crew, a claim we could not corroborate.

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?
Unknown
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a tower100 ft Aermotor steel tower with metal 7 by 7 ft cabThe design: Aermotor
Built of
Steel
Built
1934
Height
100 ft (30.5 m)
Elevation
295 ft (90 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service (De Soto National Forest)
Land
Federal land
Location
Perry County, Mississippi
Coordinates
31.08517, −89.05308
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-ms-paret

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 2.9 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. 1934 BuiltBuilt by a CCC unit with enrollees from New Jersey, per the NHLR description only; no second source foundSource: nhlr.org
  2. No record between 1934 and 2003
  3. 2003 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered July 24, 2003 as US 524, MS 4; nominated by Judith Henry, District Ranger, De Soto RDSource: nhlr.org
  4. No record between 2003 and 2026
  5. 2026 EventWildfire reported in the De Soto National Forest near Paret Tower Road; the report does not mention the towerSource: wdam.com
  6. 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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Paret Lookout Tower is in Perry County, Mississippi, on the De Soto National Forest.1 The U.S. Forest Service administers it.1

The National Historic Lookout Register describes a steel Aermotor tower, 100 feet tall, with a metal cab that measures 7 by 7 feet.1 According to the register, a Civilian Conservation Corps unit whose members came from New Jersey built it in 1934.1 We found no second source for that date or that crew, so treat it as the register's account.

The register was filed on July 24, 2003.1 The nominator was Judith Henry, district ranger of the De Soto Ranger District.1 Only a few of the roughly 50 state and federal fire towers in southern Mississippi are still left, and the register counts this one among them.1 The view from the tower takes in a 16,000-acre piece of national forest that the National Guard uses as a shooting range.1

That 2003 entry is the most recent description we found. A WDAM report dated February 22, 2026 says a wildfire in the De Soto National Forest was near Paret Tower Road and had forced evacuations in south Perry County.2 The report does not say whether the fire reached the tower.2

We found no information on public access, so ask the Forest Service before going near the site. Do not climb the tower.

  1. Paret Lookout Tower, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/ms/paret-lookout-tower/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Perry Co. wildfire forces evacuation, crews battle 500+ burning acres, WDAM, https://www.wdam.com/2026/02/22/perry-co-wildfire-forces-evacuation (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Photo of Paret Lookout Tower
Photo: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source

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Sources

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

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