FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Missoula County, Montana

Mount Henry

A 1932 L-4 cab on a 20-foot timber tower near Seeley Lake, destroyed in 1952 per firelookout.com; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1952 per firelookout.com; the Forest Fire Lookout Association list marks the 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 towerL-4 cab on a 20-foot round timber towerThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1926
Height
20 ft (6.1 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Lolo National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Missoula County, Montana
Coordinates
47.24986, −113.61674
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-mt-mount-henry-2

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 4.4 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. 1913 EventPlan for one of three permanent lookout stations, with one on Mount Henry (Daily Missoulian, as quoted by Forest Lookouts)Source: montanalookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1921 EventA station had been in use on Mount Henry for a number of yearsSource: montanalookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1926 BuiltCabin on the summit per firelookout.com; the 1921 item suggests earlier useSource: firelookout.com
  4. 1932 Built20-foot round timber tower with an L-4 cabSources: firelookout.com, montanalookouts.weebly.com
  5. No record between 1932 and 1952
  6. 1952 DestroyedDestroyed per firelookout.comSource: firelookout.com
  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.

Mount Henry, a lookout nine miles northwest of Seeley Lake in Missoula County, stands in the Lolo National Forest.1,2 Montana also has a Mount Henry lookout in Lincoln County, so the two should not be confused.3

In April 1913 the Daily Missoulian reported a plan for three permanent lookout stations, one of them on Mount Henry, which it called the most prominent peak in the Burcell range.2 A September 1921 item said a station had been in use there for a number of years.2 Firelookout.com dates a cabin on the summit to 1926.1 The dates do not line up, and neither source explains the gap.1,2

A round timber tower, 20 feet tall, carrying an L-4 cab, was put up in 1932.2 Firelookout.com describes it as a pole tower at the east end of a summit ridge about four miles long.1

Firelookout.com says the tower was destroyed in 1952.1 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's Montana list now marks the lookout as gone.3

None of the sources describes what, if anything, remains at the site, or whether the ground is open to visitors.

  1. Mt. Henry Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/mt/mthenry368.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Mount Henry - Forest Lookouts, Forest Lookouts (Montana), https://montanalookouts.weebly.com/mount-henry1.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. 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: design, height, 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, 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.