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Fire lookout · Grafton County, New Hampshire

Black Mountain (Benton)

Grafton County, NH: a Black Mountain (Benton) lookout site from 1911; the discontinued lookout was destroyed in 1978, and no source describes the summit today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Discontinued and destroyed in 1978; no source describes what remains on the summit

Visit & stay

Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent. You may still be able to visit the site.

Access

Open to the public. The summit is in the White Mountain National Forest; the hiking route starts at Howe Hill Road in Benton

Road to the top?
Unknown
Trail
Black Mountain Trail from the trailhead on Howe Hill Road in Benton; there is no tower to climb

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a towerCT-2 timber tower with L-4 type cab (1941)Cab: L-4; tower: Region 6 timber towers (CT, TT)
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1915
Height
28 ft (8.5 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
White Mountain National Forest; the NH Forestry department ran the tower until 1939
Land
Federal land
Location
Grafton County, New Hampshire
Coordinates
44.07454, −71.92235
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-nh-black-mountain-benton

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 3.9 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. 1911 EventSite first established as an observation pointSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1915 BuiltNew and improved watch tower in the 1915-1916 bienniumSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1926 Replaced by a new structureSteel tower with a wooden house on top erected in the 1926 season, replacing an older wooden observation towerSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1927 StaffedHerbert L. Beamis had been the watchman for four yearsSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1934 EventLightning melted about 2,000 feet of telephone line and cut off the station; the tower was not damagedSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  6. 1938 EventDamaged in the Great New England HurricaneSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  7. 1939 EventWhite Mountain National Forest took over operation of the tower from the stateSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  8. 1941 Built28-foot CT-2 timber tower with an L-4 type cab constructedSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  9. 1944 StaffedMaud Bickford returned as the fire watcher; she held the job the year beforeSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  10. No record between 1944 and 1978
  11. 1978 DestroyedThe discontinued lookout was destroyedSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  12. 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.

Black Mountain stands in Benton, New Hampshire, and the White Mountain National Forest now covers its summit.1,2 The site was first used as an observation point in 1911.2 A new and improved watch tower went up in the 1915-1916 biennium.2 In the 1926 season the state forestry department erected a steel tower with a wooden house on top.2 It replaced an older wooden tower, the first observation tower built when the state set up its forestry department, which had grown unsafe with age.2 The watchman's cabin was enlarged at the same time, with a new room on one end.2

By 1927 Herbert L. Beamis had been the watchman there for four years.2 In 1934 a lightning bolt melted about 2,000 feet of the telephone line that ran to the station.2 The station was cut off from the outside world until new line was laid.2 The tower came through the strike unharmed, but the watchman's wife was stunned.2 Maud Bickford returned to a station on the mountain in 1944, a job she had also held the year before.2

The Great New England Hurricane of 1938 damaged the lookout.2 In 1939 the White Mountain National Forest took over operation of the tower from the state, according to a report in the Portsmouth Herald.2 In 1941 a 28-foot timber tower with a cab of the L-4 type went up.2

The lookout was discontinued and destroyed in 1978.2 The Forest Fire Lookout Association lists the tower as gone.3 Wikipedia's article on the state forest describes a Black Mountain lookout station as "no longer present."1

A hiking blog's trip report starts its climb from the trailhead on Howe Hill Road in Benton.4 No source we read describes what, if anything, remains on the summit today.

  1. Black Mountain State Forest, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Mountain_State_Forest (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Black Mountain (Benton), Forest Lookouts, https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/black-mountain-benton.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. New Hampshire Fire Towers, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/nh/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Black Mountain trip report, Hike Over the Hill, https://hikeoverthehill.blogspot.com/2019/09/black-mountain.html (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. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- eastern US (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) Gave us: design, height, agency, ownership, links easternuslookouts.weebly.com · No licence stated; facts only (county, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, status, height, design hints, register links). The site's own historical quotes, newspaper citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, access, staffing, 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.