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Fire lookout · Hood River County, Oregon

Buck Peak Lookout Site (Hood River County)

Also known as Buck Peak

Mt. Hood NF L-4 cab site on Buck Peak, Hood River County: 1933 construction, register says erected 1934, gone by 1950; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Gone by 1950, per the register and firelookout.com.

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
Ground-level cabL-4 cabThe design: L-4
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Built
1934
Height
12 ft (3.7 m)
Elevation
4,751 ft (1,448 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Hood River County, Oregon
Coordinates
45.49871, −121.85971
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-buck-peak-hood-river-county

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 3.5 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. 1933 EventPanorama photos of the Buck Peak Lookout taken November 9, 1933.Sources: firetower.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1934 BuiltRegister says the USFS erected an L-4 cab on this site. Newspaper-era items suggest construction was underway in 1933.Source: firetower.org
  3. No record between 1934 and 1950
  4. 1950 RemovedGone by 1950 per the register and firelookout.com.Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  5. No record between 1950 and 2010
  6. 2010 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered August 17, 2010.Source: firetower.org
  7. 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 Peak sits in the Mount Hood region of Hood River County, Oregon, at about 4,751 feet.1 In August 1933 a pack train carrying lumber for lookout house construction went off a narrow ledge between Lost Lake and Buck Mountain, and one horse had to be shot.2 A panorama of the "Buck Peak Lookout" was taken on November 9, 1933.1,2 The register says the Forest Service erected an L-4 cab on the site in 1934, while the 1933 items suggest that construction was already under way, so the two sources date the work to different years.1,2

Both the register and firelookout.com put its removal no later than 1950.1,3

None of the sources checked describes what remains at the site today. Firelookout.com places the site in the Mt. Hood National Forest.3 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's Oregon list gives the county as "Hood River/ Multnomah," which differs from the register's Hood River County.4

  1. Buck Peak Lookout Site (Hood River County), Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org), http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/buck-peak-lookout-site-hood-river-county/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Buck Peak, Forest Lookouts (Oregon), https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/buck-peak.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Buck Peak Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/buckpeak.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Oregon Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/or/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Buck Peak Lookout panoramic 11-9-33
Buck Peak Lookout panoramic 11-9-33Photo: National Archives-Pacific Northwest Region, 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: 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, 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.