FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Grant County, Oregon

Ant Hill Lookout Site

Umatilla NF lookout near Monument, Oregon: an L-4 cab on a pole tower, built 1933-35 (sources differ), destroyed or dismantled in 1956.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Destroyed or dismantled in 1956 per the register and the Heppner district report; firelookout.com says a later platform tower burned in 2024

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 towerL-4 cab on a round timber pole towerThe design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Built
1935
Height
16 ft (4.9 m)
Elevation
4,602 ft (1,403 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service (Umatilla National Forest)
Land
Federal land
Location
Grant County, Oregon
Coordinates
44.87261, −119.57008
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-ant-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 4.1 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 StaffedHarold Gentry named as lookout, per firelookout.comSource: firelookout.com
  2. 1935 BuiltRegister and Rex's page date the tower to 1935; firelookout.com gives 1933. See resolved_conflicts.Sources: firetower.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1936 StaffedHarold Stevens named as lookout, per firelookout.comSource: firelookout.com
  4. 1947 StaffedGladwin E. Hudson, 17, a Heppner high school student employed as a forest service lookout here, was fatally hurt by a falling limb in a line squall (Oregonian report quoted by Rex's page)Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1956 DestroyedRegister says destroyed; the Heppner Ranger District annual report said it would be dismantled that seasonSources: firetower.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com, firelookout.com
  6. 1956 Removed'Removed' field on FFLOS detail page: "1956".Source: FFLOS register entry
  7. No record between 1956 and 2019
  8. 2019 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: November 1, 2019Source: FFLOS register entry
  9. 2024 Burnedfirelookout.com says a later 10-foot wooden platform tower burned in 2024; no other source foundSource: firelookout.com
  10. 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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Former Fire Lookout Sites Register says a 24-foot pole tower with an L-4 cab went up on the site in 1935.1 Rex's page gives a 16-foot round timber tower with an L-4 cab for 1935,2 while firelookout.com dates a 20-foot pole tower to 1933.3 The sources disagree on both the year and the height.1,2,3 The site lies about seven miles northwest of Monument, in Grant County, within the Umatilla National Forest.3

Lookouts were stationed here through the 1930s and 1940s.2,3 Firelookout.com names Harold Gentry for 1934 and Harold Stevens for 1936.3 An October 1935 Heppner paper reported that a woman had come to the station for a week to join her husband there.2 In July 1947 a 17-year-old Heppner high school student working as a forest service lookout here was fatally hurt by a falling limb during a line squall, according to an Oregonian report quoted on Rex's page.2

The Heppner Ranger District's annual report said in January 1956 that the lookout would be dismantled that season.2 The register says it was destroyed in 1956.1 Firelookout.com adds that a later ten-foot wooden platform tower, whose history it calls in question, burned in 2024.3

The register lists the site as a former lookout administered by the U.S. Forest Service.1 No source we read describes what, if anything, remains on the summit today, or whether the road to it is open to visitors.1,2,3

  1. Ant Hill Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/ant-hill-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Ant Hill, Forest Lookouts (Oregon), Rex's Fire Lookout Page, https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/ant-hill.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Ant Hill Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/anthill.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Ant Hill Lookout 1935 - 1956
Ant Hill Lookout 1935 - 1956 (1935)Photo: Howard Verschoor collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source

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.

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, ownership, 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
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists 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
  3. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  4. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: design, height, links Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  5. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, 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.