FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Herkimer County, New York

Dairy Hill

CCC-built 79-ft-6-in tower on Dairy Hill, closed 1986; sources disagree on removal (1991 list vs 1992 sale and move); no source describes the summit today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Removed after vandalism. The Searchable list gives 1991; the Eastern lookouts site says it was sold and moved in 1992.

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 tower79-foot-6-inch International Derrick steel tower provided to New York State by the US Forest Service, with an enclosed metal cabThe design: IDECO
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1934
Height
79 ft (24.2 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Unknown
Land
Unknown
Location
Herkimer County, New York
Coordinates
43.20372, −74.90367
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-ny-dairy-hill

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 3.8 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. 1934 BuiltCCC built the tower; provided to the state by the US Forest ServiceSources: nysffla.org, en.wikipedia.org
  2. 1934 EventHerkimer County site purchase per a January 1934 newspaper report; the 1942 survey says the land was state-ownedSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1935 First staffedFirst staffed in 1935, reporting 6 fires and 568 visitorsSources: nysffla.org, en.wikipedia.org
  4. No record between 1935 and 1986
  5. 1986 ClosedFire lookout operations ceased; tower and cabin later removed after extreme vandalismSources: nysffla.org, en.wikipedia.org
  6. 1991 RemovedSearchable list gives 1991 as the removal yearSource: nysffla.org
  7. 1992 MovedEastern lookouts site says the 82-foot tower was sold and moved to a new locationSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  8. 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.

Herkimer County bought a site in the town of Norway for a new fire observation station in 1934, according to a newspaper report from that year.1 The Civilian Conservation Corps built a tower on the mountain that year.2 It was a 79-foot-6-inch International Derrick tower that the U.S. Forest Service provided to the state.3,2 The first staffed season, 1935, logged six fires and 568 visitors.3,2 The lookout ceased operating in 1986.3,2

After that the sources part ways. The Searchable list says the tower and its cabin were removed because of extreme vandalism, and it gives 1991 as the year of removal.3 The Eastern lookouts site says instead that the 82-foot tower was sold and moved to a new location in 1992.1 The New York directory lists Dairy Hill as gone.4

Heights differ too. Two sources give 79 feet 6 inches.3,2 The Eastern site gives 82 feet.1 Its quote of a 1942 Coast and Geodetic Survey station description puts the tower at about 80 feet, and it places the tower on land owned by New York State, which does not fit the 1934 county purchase.1

The sources also place the summit differently. The Searchable list puts the tower five miles east of Newport.3 Wikipedia places the mountain southeast of Norway.2 The 1942 survey gives a point about eight miles northwest of Salisbury.1

No source describes the summit today. None says whether footings or a cabin remain, who owns the land now, or whether visitors can reach it.

  1. Dairy Hill - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Forest Lookouts, https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/dairy-hill.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Dairy Hill, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dairy_Hill (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Searchable list of NY Fire Towers, New York State Chapter, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://nysffla.org/alphalist.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. New York Fire Towers, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/ny/ (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: height, 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, staffing, 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.