FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Missoula County, Montana

Lolo Springs

Lolo NF lookout near Lolo Pass in Missoula County, MT: 1922 platform, cupola cabin, about 1934 L-4 tower around it, destroyed 1963; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1963 per firelookout.com and the library note on a 1957 photo; the Forest Fire Lookout Association index lists it as Tower Gone.

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 towerRegion-1 log cupola cabin inside a 30-foot pole L-4 towerThe designs: L-4, Cupola house
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1922
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Lolo National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Missoula County, Montana
Coordinates
46.76002, −114.53345
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-mt-lolo-springs

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 a typical height for a lookout like it.

Downloads about 3.9 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. 1922 Built30-foot pole platform built in 1922; the cupola cabin is dated to the 1920s (firelookout.com). A June 1922 newspaper item mentions a station recently built near Lolo Hot Springs.Sources: firelookout.com, montanalookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1928 Staffed1928 newspaper notices mention a man employed as a lookout at the Lolo Springs station and a Forest Service worker at Lolo Hot Springs who said he went weeks at a time without seeing anyoneSource: montanalookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1934 Altered30-foot pole L-4 tower built around the cupola cabin, about 1934 (firelookout.com)Source: firelookout.com
  4. No record between 1934 and 1957
  5. 1957 EventPhoto dated October 1957 shows a metal sign at the base of the lookout damaged by close-range shotgun blasts; a library note calls the lookout likely Lolo SpringsSource: mtmemory.org
  6. 1963 DestroyedDestroyed in 1963Sources: firelookout.com, mtmemory.org
  7. 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.

Lolo Springs stood on the Lolo National Forest in Missoula County, Montana, about nine miles north-northeast of Lolo Pass, at an elevation of 5,320 feet.1

Firelookout.com dates a log cupola cabin, a Region-1 design, to the 1920s, and a 30-foot pole platform to 1922.1 A June 1922 newspaper item about a Forest Service inspection tour mentions a lookout station recently built near Lolo Hot Springs, which may be the same place.2 About 1934, a 30-foot pole L-4 tower was put up with the cabin inside it.1

The station was in use in 1928. A September 1928 Missoula newspaper notice refers to a Forest Service lookout at the Lolo Springs station.2 Another 1928 item relays a letter from a Forest Service worker at Lolo Hot Springs, who reported going weeks at a time without seeing anyone.2

A photograph dated October 1957 in the Montana History Portal shows a metal sign at the base of a lookout, damaged by close-range shotgun blasts.3 The photo's title calls the lookout Lolo Peak, but a library note from the University of Montana says it is likely the Lolo Springs lookout.3

Firelookout.com says the lookout was destroyed in 1963.1 The library note gives the same year.3 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's index lists the site as gone.4

No source we read describes what remains at the site today, or whether the public may visit it.

  1. Lolo Springs Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/mt/lolosprings.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Lolo Springs - Forest Lookouts, Forest Lookouts (Rex's Fire Lookout Page), https://montanalookouts.weebly.com/lolo-springs.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Damaged sign at Lolo Peak lookout [umt018358], Montana History Portal (University of Montana Mansfield Library), https://www.mtmemory.org/nodes/view/114482 (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, 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.