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Fire lookout · Missoula County, Montana

Wildhorse Point

Missoula County, MT 30-foot pole L-4 tower built in 1936 on the Lolo National Forest and destroyed in 1953 per firelookout.com; the FFLA list agrees it is gone.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed in 1953 per firelookout.com; FFLA status Gone; beyond that status, no source describes what remains at the site

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 tower30-foot pole tower of the L-4 typeThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1936
Height
30 ft (9.1 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Lolo National Forest (per firelookout.com)
Land
Unknown
Location
Missoula County, Montana
Coordinates
46.92695, −114.32064
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-mt-wildhorse-point

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 4.1 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. 1936 Builtfirelookout.com: '1936: 30' pole L-4 tower.'Source: firelookout.com
  2. No record between 1936 and 1953
  3. 1953 Destroyedfirelookout.com: 'Destroyed 1953.'Source: firelookout.com
  4. 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.

Wildhorse Point is the site of a former lookout tower on the Lolo National Forest, about 14 miles west-northwest of Missoula, in Missoula County, Montana.1,2

firelookout.com dates the tower to 1936 and describes it as a 30-foot pole tower of the L-4 type. It gives the site's elevation as 5,804 feet.1 The association's list places the site at 46.92695, -114.32064.2

The page says the tower was destroyed in 1953.1 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's list also marks the tower as gone.2

Beyond that status, no source describes what, if anything, remains at the site today, and none says whether visitors can reach it.1,2

  1. Wildhorse Point Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/mt/wildhorsepoint.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. 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. 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.