FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Sanders County, Montana

Mount Silcox

A 1908 log cabin, a 1923 windmill tower and a 1925 D-6 cupola cabin, burned to the ground in 1967; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Burned to the ground in October 1967 per the Thompson Falls post; firelookout.com gives 1967 as destroyed

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
Trail
Trail 450 north of the Clark Fork River per the Thompson Falls post; a 1931 NGS station description says to follow Forest Service trail signs from Thompson Falls

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Ground-level cabStandard D-6 cupola cabin (1925) on a rock foundationThe design: D-6
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1908
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Lolo National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Sanders County, Montana
Coordinates
47.63538, −115.28137
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-mt-mount-silcox

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 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. 1907 EventPeak chosen as a lookout site and named for F. A. SilcoxSource: montanalookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1908 BuiltLog cabin on the summit; a July 1908 report says it lacked only the shake roofSources: firelookout.com, montanalookouts.weebly.com, facebook.com
  3. 1914 EventLookout credited with spotting dozens of fires that were put out before damageSource: facebook.com
  4. 1914 StaffedOscar H. Moen served as summer lookoutSource: montanalookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1923 Built35-foot steel windmill tower added to improve visibilitySources: firelookout.com, facebook.com
  6. 1925 Replaced by a new structureStandard D-6 cupola cabin on a rock foundation replaced the old cabin and tower; firelookout.com dates it 1926Sources: montanalookouts.weebly.com, facebook.com
  7. 1930 StaffedFred Irvin set to take the lookout job that summerSource: montanalookouts.weebly.com
  8. 1935 ClosedRoutine visual observation discontinued; the peak kept for emergencies, with a lookout on Clark Mountain taking its placeSources: montanalookouts.weebly.com, facebook.com
  9. No record between 1935 and 1952
  10. 1952 AbandonedOfficially abandoned by the USFSSource: facebook.com
  11. 1965 EventPublic use with a Montana Fish and Game permit ran through 1965Source: facebook.com
  12. 1967 BurnedBurned to the ground in October 1967 after teenagers accidentally set fire; firelookout.com says destroyed 1967Sources: firelookout.com, facebook.com
  13. 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 Silcox stands about four miles northeast of Thompson Falls in Sanders County, on the Lolo National Forest.1,2 The forest service chose the peak as a lookout site in 1907 and named it for F. A. Silcox, the first supervisor of the Cabinet reserve.2

A log cabin went up on the summit in 1908. A July report said it was finished apart from the shake roof.1,2,3 In 1923 a 35-foot steel windmill tower went up to improve the view.1,3 In 1925 a standard D-6 cupola cabin took the place of the old cabin and tower.2 It sat on a rock foundation about half a mile from the summit.3 Firelookout.com dates that cupola cabin to 1926 and puts it half a mile southwest of the summit.1

Lookouts were posted on the peak through the 1910s and 1920s.2 Newspapers name Oscar H. Moen as the summer lookout in 1914 and say Fred Irvin was set to take the job in 1930.2 A 1914 newspaper credited the lookout with spotting dozens of fires that were put out before they did damage.3

In 1935 routine watch on Mount Silcox was discontinued, and the peak was kept for emergencies. A lookout on Clark Mountain across the river from Thompson Falls took its place.2,3 The Forest Service gave up the lookout in 1952.3 Through 1965 the public could still use it with a Montana Fish and Game permit.3 In October 1967 teenagers trying to get a fire going in the old stove set the wooden building ablaze by accident, and it burned down.3 Firelookout.com also gives 1967 as the year it was destroyed.1 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's Montana list marks the site as gone.4

According to a Thompson Falls community post, remnants of the original telephone line, including a few ceramic insulators, could still be found as late as the 1990s on the peak and elsewhere along Trail 450.3 No source describes what remains today, and none says whether the site is open to visitors.

  1. Mt. Silcox Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/mt/mtsilcox.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Mount Silcox - Forest Lookouts, Forest Lookouts (Montana), https://montanalookouts.weebly.com/mount-silcox.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. LOOKING BACK: Fire lookout built on Mount Silcox, 1908, Thompson Falls, MT (Facebook), https://www.facebook.com/ThompsonFallsMT/posts/looking-back-fire-lookout-built-on-mount-silcox-1908construction-of-fire-lookout/1513999370771357/ (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, visiting details, 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.