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Fire lookout · Baker County, Oregon

Huckleberry Mountain Lookout Site (Baker County)

Also known as Huckleberry Mountain

A 1933 tower with an L-4 cab replaced a 1920s platform on Huckleberry Mountain; sources disagree on its height and on whether it fell in 1974 or 1976.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. The tower is gone. Sources give 1974 or 1976 as the year it came down.

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 native timber towerThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1920
Height
14 ft (4.3 m)
Elevation
5,786 ft (1,764 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Baker County, Oregon
Coordinates
44.67521, −118.18891
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-huckleberry-mountain-baker-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 3.6 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. 1920 Built'Built' field on FFLOS detail pageSource: FFLOS register entry
  2. 1920 EventA platform was constructed in the 1920sSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  3. 1921 FireTimber fire between Whitney and Sumpter, sighted by the lookout; 80 acres of timber destroyedSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1921 First staffedEarliest lookout named in the sources; the 1921 newspaper item mentions the summit lookoutSources: firelookout.com, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1933 BuiltTower with an L-4 cab; a CCC crew erected the timber tower that fallSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  6. 1934 FireLightning fire of about a third of an acre, spotted from the lookoutSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  7. No record between 1934 and 1967
  8. 1967 Condition assessmentForest Service inspection on November 27 (memo dated November 30, 1967); repairs estimated to give at most five more yearsSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  9. 1969 Last staffedLast name on the firelookout.com list; not necessarily the final seasonSource: firelookout.com
  10. 1974 Abandonedfirelookout.com says abandoned in 1974Source: firelookout.com
  11. 1974 DestroyedRegister says the lookout was destroyed in 1974Source: firetower.org
  12. 1974 Removed'Removed' field on FFLOS detail page: "1974".Source: FFLOS register entry
  13. 1976 DestroyedForest Lookouts page dates the destruction to 1976; conflicts with 1974Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  14. No record between 1976 and 2019
  15. 2019 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: November 19, 2019Source: FFLOS register entry
  16. 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.

A tower with an L-4 cab went up on Huckleberry Mountain in 1933, on a summit where a platform had stood since the 1920s.1,2 The register and firelookout.com give its height as 22 feet, but a Baker newspaper item from September 1933 and a 1967 Forest Service memo say 20 feet, so the height is not settled.1,2,3 A Civilian Conservation Corps crew erected the native timber tower that fall, with a cab 14 feet square.3

Lookouts were posted on the summit from at least 1921 into the 1960s.2,3 In 1921 the lookout was the first to see a timber fire between Whitney and Sumpter, which destroyed eighty acres.3 In 1934 it spotted a lightning fire of about a third of an acre, and two men from Sumpter had it under control by the next morning.3

A Forest Service inspection in November 1967 found the four tower legs structurally safe but showing heart rot. It estimated that repairs would give at most five more years, and it said replacement or abandonment should be planned for after 1973.3 The register and firelookout.com put the end in 1974, the register saying destroyed and firelookout.com saying abandoned. The Forest Lookouts page dates the destruction to 1976.1,2,3

No source we read describes what, if anything, remains on the summit today. A 1946 survey description places a bronze disk in the bedrock about 58 feet from the old tower.3 The Oregon lookout list marks the site as gone.4 We found no current access information, though a 1961 account mentions a mile-long Huckleberry Trail.3 The land is part of the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest.1

  1. Huckleberry Mountain Lookout Site (Baker County), Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, firetower.org, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/huckleberry-mountain-lookout-site-baker-county/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Huckleberry Mtn. Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/huckleberrymtn105a.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Huckleberry Mountain (Baker County), Forest Lookouts (Oregon), oregonlookouts.weebly.com, https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/huckleberry-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Oregon lookouts, alphabetical list, Fire Lookout Association, firelookout.org, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/or/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Huckleberry Mountain Lookout
Huckleberry Mountain LookoutPhoto: Howard Verschoor collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Huckleberry Mountain Lookout panoramic
Huckleberry Mountain Lookout panoramicPhoto: National Archives-Pacific Northwest Region, via 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, 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, 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

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