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Fire lookout · Lewis County, New York

Number Four Fire Tower (now at Lowville Demonstration Forest)

Also known as Lowville Demonstration Forest, Lowville Demostration Area Fire Tower

1928 Fisher Forestry lookout at Number Four, Lewis County, NY; closed in the early 1980s, and its upper section now stands at the DEC Lowville demonstration area.

Original site: Number Four Fire Tower

Visit & stay

Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.

Access

Open to the public. DEC demonstration area in Lowville; the DEC invites visitors to climb to the observation cabin at the top

Can you climb it?
Yes
Road to the top?
Yes, you can drive up
Trail
On the DEC Lowville demonstration area; the DEC office sits just past the tower
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a towerAermotor LX25 steel tower with ladders between landings at first, later stairs; glass-enclosed observatoryThe design: Aermotor LX-24 / LX-25
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1928
Height
Unknown
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (Lowville demonstration area)
Land
State land
Location
Lewis County, New York
Coordinates
43.80934, −75.47313
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-ny-number-four-at-lowville-demonstration-forest

View from the cab

What you see from the 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.

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. 1928 BuiltErected by the Fisher Forestry and Realty Company with Conservation Department co-operation. Sources give 75, 80 and 90 feet for the height.Sources: easternuslookouts.weebly.com, nysffla.org, en.wikipedia.org
  2. No record between 1928 and 1945
  3. 1945 AlteredObserver's cabin and standard stairs added, replacing the ladders (per a 2019 post by Fred Knauf). Wikipedia dates the stair change to about 1960.Source: nysffla.org
  4. 1945 StaffedConservation Department took over operation from the landowner; the duties of the Beaver Lake Mountain lookout were transferred to Number FourSources: en.wikipedia.org, easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1958 EventLand holding with the cabin and tower transferred from the landowner to the state (Wikipedia)Source: en.wikipedia.org
  6. 1960 AlteredLadders replaced with stairs, around 1960 (Wikipedia; conflicts with the 1945 date in the newsletter)Source: en.wikipedia.org
  7. No record between 1960 and 1982
  8. 1982 ClosedFinal year of operation, the operations discontinued (eastern lookouts record); Wikipedia says closed in the early 1980sSources: easternuslookouts.weebly.com, en.wikipedia.org
  9. 1984 MovedObserver's cabin moved to Nicks Lake Campground around 1984 (Wikipedia)Source: en.wikipedia.org
  10. 1987 RemovedTower removed from the original site; the chief reason cited was extensive vandalismSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  11. Date unknown MovedMoved from Number Four to Lowville Demonstration Forest.Source: FFLA
  12. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Number Four lookout was built in 1928 by the Fisher Forestry and Realty Company, with help from the Conservation Department.1 Newspapers from that summer put the steel tower at close to 80 feet, with a glass-enclosed observatory.1 Later accounts do not agree on the height. A 2018 reader quoted in the New York chapter's newsletter says it was originally 75 feet, and the DEC says 90 feet.2,3 Wikipedia gives 75 feet too, and names an Aermotor LX25 model that used ladders, not stairs, between its landings.4

The Conservation Department took over running the tower in 1945, and the duties of the Beaver Lake Mountain lookout moved to Number Four.4,1 The same newsletter quotes a 2019 Facebook post by Fred Knauf, who says an observer's cabin and standard stairs arrived in 1945 in place of the ladders.2 Wikipedia puts the switch to stairs around 1960, and says the land passed from the landowner to the state in 1958.4

The eastern lookouts record gives 1982 as the final year of operation, and says the tower was removed in 1987, mainly because of vandalism.1 Wikipedia dates the closure to the early 1980s, with dismantling after that.4

The DEC says the upper section was moved to Lowville and displayed near the entrance of its demonstration area.3 Wikipedia says that section was used to build a demonstration tower beside the DEC office.4 The observer's cabin went to Nicks Lake Campground around 1984, according to Wikipedia, and the ranger cabin at Lowville came from Gomer Hill.4,3

Today the upper section stands at the DEC demonstration area, and the DEC invites visitors to climb to the observation cabin at the top.3 The DEC office sits just past the tower, according to its directions.3 Only the tower footers remain at the original site.4 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's New York list gives the Lowville Demonstration Forest tower as the relocated Number Four.5

  1. Number Four - Forest Lookouts, Forest Lookouts (easternuslookouts.weebly.com), https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/number-four.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association, New York State Chapter newsletter, June 2023, https://www.nysffla.org/News2023/2023%20Jun%20final.pdf (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Lowville Forestry Demonstration Area, NYSDEC, https://dec.ny.gov/places/lowville-forestry-demonstration-area (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Number Four Fire Tower, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_Four_Fire_Tower (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  5. New York lookout list, Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org), https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/ny/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Sources

  1. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: name, location, county, type, status, dates, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  2. Map and Coordinates List for NYS DEC Firetowers (Andy Arthur) Gave us: agency, ownership, links Andy Arthur, andyarthur.org (CC BY 3.0) · CC BY 3.0, credit: Andy Arthur, andyarthur.org. Facts + short description text reused under that licence. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  3. Forest Fire Lookout Association, New York State Chapter 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
  4. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, agency, access, 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.