Fire lookout · Suffolk County, New York
Dix Hill Lookout Site
Suffolk County, NY 60-foot Aermotor LS-40 built 1924 with landowner funds; closed 1948 and removed 1949. Land now privately held and developed; no source describes the site today.
- Gone
- Private land
- Verified
Private land
No public access. Please do not trespass; view it only from public land. Register says the land is now privately held and has been developed; no public access is described
Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Closed 1948 and removed 1949 per the register. The land is now privately held and has been developed
Visit & stay
Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent.
Access
Private land. See the warning at the top of this page.
- Road to the top?
- Unknown
Facts
- Status
- Type
- Cab on a tower60-foot Aermotor LS-40 towerThe design: Aermotor LS-40
- Built of
- SteelGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
- Built
- 1924
- Height
- 60 ft (18.3 m)
- Elevation
- 310 ft (95 m)
- Agency
- New York State Conservation Commission, Bureau of Forest Fire Control
- Land
- Unknown
- Location
- Suffolk County, New York
- Coordinates
- 40.81050, −73.34633 sources disagree
- Registers
- This entry
- VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
- Firefinder id
us-ny-dix-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 3.4 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
- 1924 BuiltErected by the Conservation Commission with funds from a nearby landownerSources: firetower.org, easternuslookouts.weebly.com, nysffla.org
- 1932 EventTwo-way radio tests with a state airplane in late fall 1932, reported March 1933; semiportable set at the towerSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
- 1945 EventNotice proposed moving the Dix Hills tower to High Hill for greater heightSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
- 1948 ClosedClosed in 1948; used through the 1948 seasonSources: firetower.org, nysffla.org
- 1949 RemovedRemoved in 1949 by the NY State Conservation Commission, per the registerSource: firetower.org
- No record between 1949 and 2009
- 2009 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered January 18, 2009 as US 552, NY 6Source: firetower.org
- 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 (opens another site) (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).
Story
Researched 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.
The Dix Hill tower went up in 1924 in the Town of Huntington, in western Suffolk County on Long Island.1,2 The state Conservation Commission put it up, using money from a nearby landowner.2,3 It was a 60-foot Aermotor LS-40 tower.1,3
A March 1933 report described tests in late 1932, in which a semiportable radio set at the Dix Hill tower kept two-way contact over 50 miles with a state airplane.2
A June 8, 1945 notice from the Long Island State Park Commission proposed relocating the Dix Hills tower to High Hill, where more height would cover more ground.2
The Former Fire Lookout Sites register says the tower was closed in 1948 and removed in 1949, and it does not mention a move.1 The NYSFFLA newsletter says it was in use through the 1948 season.3
Today the site is on privately owned land that has been developed.1 No source we read describes what, if anything, remains at the site today. Because the land is private, visitors should not assume they can go there.
- Dix Hill Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/ny/dix-hill-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
- Dix Hills, Forest Lookouts, https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/dix-hills.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
- 2024 January newsletter, NYSFFLA, https://www.nysffla.org/News2024/2024%20Jan%20final.pdf (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
Photos
Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.
Where sources disagree
We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.
Sources disagree on the location by 870 m.
- FFLOS: 40.81050, −73.34633
- FOREST LOOKOUTS -- eastern US (easternuslookouts.weebly.com): 40.80500, −73.33900
The map uses the position from FFLOS.
Sources
- Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) (opens another site) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, dates, photos, links Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
- Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists (opens another site) Gave us: type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
- FOREST LOOKOUTS -- eastern US (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) (opens another site) Gave us: 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
- Forest Fire Lookout Association, New York State Chapter (opens another site) Gave us: dates, links Forest Fire Lookout Association, New York State Chapter (nysffla.org) · No licence stated; facts only (dates, names, the kind of work done). Every note is our own wording and every event links to the chapter newsletter it comes from. Positions are copied from the NHLR and FFLA records (the chapter publishes none). · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
- Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, access, 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
- FFLOS register entry US 552 (firetower.org) (opens another site)
- FFLA New York lookout list (firelookout.org) (opens another site)
- Forest Fire Lookout Association, New York State Chapter: work on Dix Hill Lookout Site (opens another site)
- Dix Hills (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) (opens another site)
Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.