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Fire lookout · Flathead County, Montana

Johnson Peak

Flathead County, MT 90-foot Aermotor tower (1934); tower gone by 1984, L-4 cab lost to snow in 2011-12; no source describes the peak today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Tower gone by 1984; L-4 cab destroyed by heavy snow over the winter of 2011-2012, per FireLookout.com. A wooden patrol tower about 1.5 miles northeast was noted as still there, undated.

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 tower90-foot steel Aermotor tower with an L-4 cabCab: L-4; tower: Aermotor
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1934
Height
90 ft (27.4 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Flathead National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Flathead County, Montana
Coordinates
48.44975, −114.68630
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-mt-johnson-peak

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 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. 1934 Built90-foot steel Aermotor tower with an L-4 cabSource: firelookout.com
  2. No record between 1934 and 1957
  3. 1957 StaffedDonald Hook listed as lookout personnelSource: firelookout.com
  4. 1958 StaffedJames G. Christianson listed as lookout personnelSource: firelookout.com
  5. 1966 StaffedListed as 'Johnson' among 21 lookouts occupied on the Flathead National Forest during the fire season; full name not given, so identity is likely but not confirmedSource: fs.usda.gov
  6. No record between 1966 and 1984
  7. 1984 RemovedTower gone in 1984; the page does not say howSource: firelookout.com
  8. No record between 1984 and 2011
  9. 2011 DestroyedL-4 cab destroyed by heavy snow over the winter of 2011/2012Source: firelookout.com
  10. 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.

Johnson Peak is a former lookout in Flathead County, about 16 miles west of Whitefish, on the Flathead National Forest.1,2 The peak stands at 6,009 feet.1 FireLookout.com says the lookout was a 90-foot steel Aermotor tower with an L-4 cab, built in 1934.1

FireLookout.com names Donald Hook as lookout personnel in 1957 and James G. Christianson in 1958.1 A 1966 Forest Service list of the lookouts occupied during that year's fire season includes one called "Johnson." The list gives no full name, so it may refer to this peak but the sources do not confirm it.3

The tower was gone by 1984, and heavy snow destroyed its L-4 cab over the winter of 2011 to 2012, according to FireLookout.com.1 The page's heading lists 1984 and 2011 as the end dates.1 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's Montana list also marks Johnson Peak as gone.4

FireLookout.com says a wooden patrol tower stands about 1.5 miles northeast of the peak, but the page does not say when it saw the tower there.1 No source I read describes what remains on the peak itself, or whether the public can reach the site.1,2,4

  1. Johnson Peak Fire Lookout Tower, FireLookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/mt/johnsonpeak.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Johnson Peak, Forest Lookouts (montanalookouts.weebly.com), https://montanalookouts.weebly.com/johnson-peak.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Trails of the Past: Historical Overview of the Flathead National Forest, Montana, 1800-1960, USDA Forest Service, https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/nfs/files/r01/flathead/publication/trails-past.pdf (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Montana Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/mt/ (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. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page 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. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: agency, ownership, 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
  4. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, staffing, 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.