FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Lane County, Oregon

Buck Mountain Lookout Site

Former Willamette NF L-4 lookout, Lane County: built 1933-34, firefinder platform 1955, burned for disposal in 1968; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Gone. The register and firelookout.com say gone by 1964; a Forest Service memo describes the house burned in September 1968.

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. On Willamette National Forest land, reached by Buck Mountain Trail #3304. No source confirms access to the lookout site itself.

Road to the top?
Unknown
Trail
Trail #3304 is reached from Blue River via Highway 126 and Forest Road 15. The trail page does not mention the Buck Mountain lookout.

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Ground-level cabL-4 cabThe design: L-4
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Built
1933
Height
Unknown
Elevation
4,768 ft (1,453 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Lane County, Oregon
Coordinates
44.23007, −122.30543
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-buck-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 a typical height for a lookout like it.

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. 1931 EventAnnounced as one of eleven new emergency lookout stations for the Santiam district.Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1933 BuiltNewspaper items say the crew finished the lookout house in November 1933. firetower.org gives 1934.Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1941 StaffedManned 75 days; reporting station at McKenzie Bridge.Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1955 AlteredFirefinder platform added to the L-4 cab.Source: firetower.org
  5. 1964 RemovedRegister and firelookout.com say the cab was gone by 1964.Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  6. 1968 RemovedForest Service memo dated October 9, 1968: house burned in early September, site cleaned up.Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  7. No record between 1968 and 2011
  8. 2011 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered April 24, 2011.Source: firetower.org
  9. 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.

Buck Mountain sits west of Blue River in Lane County, inside the Willamette National Forest.1,2 In April 1931 the Statesman Journal reported that it would be one of eleven new emergency lookout stations for the Santiam district, tied into the forest telephone system and the fire control office at Fish Lake.2 A crew led by Felix Sparks was still building the lookout house in October 1933, and by November the Eugene Guard reported it finished.2 The Former Fire Lookout Sites Register dates the L-4 cab to 1934, and says a firefinder platform went on in 1955.1

In 1941 the lookout was manned for 75 days, and reports went through the reporting station at McKenzie Bridge over Pacific Telephone and Telegraph lines.2

Sources disagree about when the cab left the mountain. The register and firelookout.com both put its removal no later than 1964.1,3 A Forest Service memo dated October 9, 1968, however, reports that the house was burned in early September that year. It adds that crews spent time burning the building, cleaning the site and disposing of what would not burn.2

None of the sources checked describes what remains at the site today. A Forest Service page for Buck Mountain Trail #3304 gives directions from Blue River, but it does not mention the Buck Mountain lookout, and it sends visitors to the local ranger station for current conditions.4

  1. Buck Mountain Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org), http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/buck-mountain-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Buck Mountain, Forest Lookouts (Oregon), https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/buck-mountain1.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Buck Mtn. Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/buckmtn77.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Buck Mountain Trail #3304, Willamette National Forest, U.S. Forest Service, https://www.fs.usda.gov/r06/willamette/recreation/trails/buck-mountain-trail-3304 (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Photo of Buck Mountain Lookout Site
Photo: 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: 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, 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.