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Fire lookout · Warren County, New York

Prospect Mountain

Prospect Mountain, Lake George: 35 ft wooden lookout (1910), 47 ft steel Aermotor tower (1932), closed after 1970 season and removed; summit road since 1969.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Closed at the end of the 1970 fire lookout season and later removed; no remains described in sources.

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. Summit reached by the road built in 1969 that lets visitors drive to the top. No tower remains are described in sources.

Road to the top?
Yes, you can drive up
Trail
Alternative hiking path follows the route of the old cable railroad (Warren County Historian).

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a tower35 ft wooden lookout tower (1910); later 47 ft Aermotor LS40 steel tower with observer cabin (1932)The design: Aermotor LS-40
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1910
Height
47 ft (14.3 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Forest, Fish and Game Commission (1910); Conservation Department (1932)
Land
Unknown
Location
Warren County, New York
Coordinates
43.42471, −73.74576
Registers
Not on a lookout register
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 10 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-ny-prospect-mountain

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 3.7 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. 1910 BuiltForest, Fish and Game Commission set up a 35 ft wooden lookout tower at a cost of $107.16Sources: easternuslookouts.weebly.com, en.wikipedia.org
  2. 1910 First staffedHotel at the summit was the headquarters for the observer after repairs and a new roofSource: en.wikipedia.org
  3. 1915 StaffedObserver Adelbert Brown used the summit hotel as his shelter; its cupola was his lookout stationSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  4. No record between 1915 and 1932
  5. 1932 BurnedWikipedia says the building at the top of the mountain burned down in 1932; the state report does not say so, see resolved_conflictsSource: en.wikipedia.org
  6. 1932 Replaced by a new structureState report calls the new tower a replacement for an older building whose top served as a lookout; the 47 ft Aermotor LS40 steel tower and observer cabin were built the same yearSources: easternuslookouts.weebly.com, en.wikipedia.org, nhlr.org
  7. 1940 EventCCC youths began setting poles for a state telephone line to the summit, linking the tower with the U.S. Army air defense command in WatertownSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  8. No record between 1940 and 1969
  9. 1969 EventRoad built up the mountain, allowing people to drive to the summitSource: warrencountyny.gov
  10. 1970 ClosedTower closed at the end of the 1970 fire lookout season because of increased use of aerial fire detectionSource: en.wikipedia.org
  11. 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.

In July 1910 the Forest, Fish and Game Commission set up a lookout on the summit of Prospect Mountain, above Lake George.1 It was a wooden tower 35 feet tall, built at a cost of $107.16.1,2 The summit had a hotel, reached by an incline railway that failed financially and stopped running in 1903.2 That hotel served as the observer's headquarters.2

In 1915 the observer, Adelbert Brown, sheltered in that hotel, and its cupola was his lookout station.1 Wikipedia says the building at the summit burned down in 1932.2 The state's 1932 report instead presents the new tower as the successor to an earlier building whose upper part had been a lookout for years.1 A 47-foot steel Aermotor LS40 tower with an observer's cabin went up that year.2,3

In 1940 CCC youths began setting poles for a state telephone line up the mountain, to link the tower with the Army air defense command in Watertown ahead of army maneuvers.1 A memoir on the state chapter's website, written by a former Lake George Village resident, says the author believed Harold Norton was the man stationed at the tower.4

A road opened to the summit in 1969, letting visitors drive up.5 Wikipedia says the tower was shut once the 1970 lookout season ended, as aerial detection took over, and was later removed.2 The Starr list marks the tower as removed, and the Forest Fire Lookout Association's New York list marks it gone.3,6

The county historian says the mountain has stayed in a similar state since the road opened, and that a parking lot was made on land near the peak.5 No source I read describes any tower remains on the summit.

  1. Prospect Mountain, Forest Lookouts (Eastern US Lookouts), quoting newspapers and state reports, https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/prospect-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Prospect Mountain (Warren County, New York), Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prospect_Mountain_(Warren_County,_New_York) (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. New York Fire Tower List, compiled by Bill Starr, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/media/2974/new_york_fire_tower_list_by_bill_starr_3-14-11.pdf (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Prospect Tower History, memoir by Richard Horn, New York State Chapter of the Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://www.nysffla.org/Prospect-Fire-Tower-History.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  5. History of Prospect Mountain, Warren County Historian, https://warrencountyny.gov/historian/proshist (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  6. New York Lookouts, 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, agency, 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.