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Fire lookout · Yamhill County, Oregon

High Heaven Lookout Site

Yamhill County, OR hilltop tower: 40-foot timber tower with live-in cab built 1953, abandoned 1965, removed May 1998; no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Tower removed in May 1998; no source describes what remains on the hilltop today

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 tower40-foot timber tower with a live-in 14 x 14 cab (materials for a 40-foot CT-3 tower bought 1952)The design: Region 6 timber towers (CT, TT)
Built of
Wood
Built
1953
Height
40 ft (12.2 m)
Elevation
1,751 ft (534 m)
Agency
Oregon Department of Forestry
Land
Unknown
Location
Yamhill County, Oregon
Coordinates
45.26487, −123.30969
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-high-heaven

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. 1941 FireRoadside smoke spotted by the lookout, linked in the account to a cigarette tossed from a car; the text also refers to 1938Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1941 StaffedLookout working on High Heaven ridge in an account dated August 7, 1941; implies the site was in use before the 1953 tower; structure not describedSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1952 EventMaterials for a 40-foot CT-3 tower and lookout cab purchased, $2098.80Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1953 Built40-foot timber tower with 14 x 14 cab completed, $5594.98; register gives 40-foot wooden tower with live-in cabSources: firetower.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1956 BuiltNew Civil Defense Communications building, $502.60 for labor onlySource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  6. 1956 AlteredTwo window sashes destroyed by vandals were replaced; garbage pit relocatedSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  7. 1965 AbandonedTower abandoned; disrepair followedSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  8. No record between 1965 and 1998
  9. 1998 RemovedTower removed in May 1998Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  10. 2010 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: November 10, 2010Source: FFLOS register entry
  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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

High Heaven is a hilltop in Yamhill County, Oregon, about six miles northwest of McMinnville.1,2 The Oregon Department of Forestry administered the site.1,2 A 1972 survey description puts the hill about eight miles out, so the sources disagree on the distance.3

Supplies for a 40-foot CT-3 tower and cab were bought in 1952, and the finished 40-foot timber tower with a 14-by-14-foot cab was completed in 1953.3 The Former Fire Lookout Sites entry gives the same 1953 date and a live-in cab.1 The 1972 survey description puts the tower at about 70 feet, against 40 feet in the other two entries.3,1,2 A 1941 account quoted by Forest Lookouts already describes a lookout working on the ridge, so the site was in use before the 1953 tower. The sources do not say what the station consisted of.3

A Lake County Examiner account, quoted by Forest Lookouts, has the lookout on High Heaven ridge spot roadside smoke that it links to a live cigarette tossed from a car.3 The item is dated August 7, 1941, but its text also refers to 1938, so its dates are hard to pin down.3

In 1956 vandals destroyed two window sashes, which were replaced, and a Civil Defense communications building went up that same year.3

The tower was abandoned in 1965 and then suffered from disrepair until it was removed in May 1998.1 Firelookout.com marks it as "R.I.P. 1953-1998" and says it was promptly abandoned in 1965.2 The Forest Lookouts page records the removal as 1998.3

The 1972 survey directions name a triangulation station called HEAVEN, tied to the center of the tower, and describe a bladed road that passes through a gate to the top of the hill.3 No source we read describes what, if anything, remains on the hilltop today, or whether that road and gate are open to the public.

  1. High Heaven Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/high-heaven-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. High Heaven Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/highheaven.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. High Heaven - Forest Lookouts, Forest Lookouts (oregonlookouts.weebly.com), https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/high-heaven.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Photo of High Heaven Lookout Site
Photo: Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source

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Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, 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, height, status, agency, staffing, 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.