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Fire lookout · Marion County, Oregon

Hoover Ridge Lookout

A 26-foot tower with an L-6 cab on Hoover Ridge near Detroit, Oregon, was built in 1932, abandoned in 1948, and is now gone.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Abandoned in 1948 and now gone; no source describes what remains at the site.

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 tower26-foot tower with an L-6 cab and a cabinThe design: L-6
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1932
Height
Unknown
Elevation
4,008 ft (1,222 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Marion County, Oregon
Coordinates
44.74247, −122.09950 sources disagree
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-hoover-ridge

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 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. 1931 EventNamed among eleven new emergency lookout stations for the Santiam districtSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1932 Built26-foot tower with L-6 cab and cabin, per the register and firelookout.comSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  3. 1933 EventThree new lookout houses planned for the summer, Hoover point among the peaksSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1936 EventWeebly history: a lookout house was constructed, no month given; conflicts with the 1932 build dateSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1948 AbandonedAbandoned, per the register and firelookout.comSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  6. No record between 1948 and 2019
  7. 2019 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered on the Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, September 18, 2019Source: firetower.org
  8. 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.

Hoover Ridge is a former lookout site in the Willamette National Forest, about two miles east of Detroit in Marion County.1,2 The register lists the U.S. Forest Service as its administrator.2

In April 1931 a newspaper item, quoted on a lookout history page, said Hoover Ridge would be one of eleven new emergency lookout stations on the Santiam district.3 A June 1933 item named Hoover point among the peaks where new lookout houses were to go up that summer.3 No source says whether that point is Hoover Ridge.

The sources disagree on the first build year. The register and firelookout.com both date the tower and cabin to 1932; the tower is 26 feet tall, with an L-6 cab.2,1 The Weebly history's only construction entry is 1936, with no month given.3

Abandonment came in 1948, and the register and firelookout.com both list the lookout as gone.2,1

No source describes what, if anything, remains at the site now.

  1. Hoover Ridge Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/hooverridge.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Hoover Ridge Lookout, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/hoover-ridge-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Hoover Ridge, Forest Lookouts (western US), Ron Kemnow, https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/hoover-ridge.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Where sources disagree

We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.

  • Sources disagree on the location by 1.0 km (0.6 mi).

    • FFLOS: 44.74247, −122.09950
    • FFLA: 44.73536, −122.10728
    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 44.73536, −122.10728

    They share a register number.

    The map uses the position from FFLOS.

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, 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, 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.