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Fire lookout · Douglas County, Oregon

Little Black Rock Lookout Site

Little Black Rock lookout site, Umpqua NF: L-5 cab built 1930, removed or destroyed 1966, emergency station lookout in 1935; no source read describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Cab removed in 1966; no source read describes what remains on the ground.

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
Trail
Forest Service trail 1562, called Little Black Rock, 0.7 miles (trail guide using USFS data). No source read ties it to the old lookout ground.

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Ground-level cabL-5 cabThe design: L-5
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Built
1930
Height
Unknown
Elevation
4,538 ft (1,383 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Douglas County, Oregon
Coordinates
43.12672, −122.53378
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-little-black-rock

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 3.7 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. 1930 BuiltL-5 cab built (register); firelookout.com gives the same yearSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  2. 1935 StaffedGeorge Norman, lookout at the Little Black Rock emergency station, kept radio contact with Diamond Rock during an August 1935 emergency, when the telephone line was out and a storm caused static and other interference on the radioSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  3. No record between 1935 and 1966
  4. 1966 RemovedCab removed (register); firelookout.com says destroyedSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  5. No record between 1966 and 2011
  6. 2011 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered on the Former Fire Lookout Sites register on March 25, 2011Source: 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.

Little Black Rock lies in Douglas County, Oregon, on the Umpqua National Forest, at an elevation of 4,538 feet.1 The Former Fire Lookout Sites register dates the lookout to 1930, when an L-5 cab was built, and says that cab was removed in 1966.1 Another lookout-history site gives the same two years but calls the 1966 end a destruction.2

A 1935 news item, quoted on a lookout-history site, reports that the telephone line between Little Black Rock and Diamond Rock was out of commission in the same emergency, and that a storm caused static and other interference.3 George Norman, the lookout at the Little Black Rock emergency station, kept in touch with Bruce Ferguson at Diamond Rock, about 25 miles away, by portable voice radio.3 The paper said radio had been a key help in that emergency.3

No source I read describes what, if anything, is left on the ground today. A Forest Service trail called Little Black Rock, numbered 1562, is a 0.7-mile trail in the Umpqua National Forest.4 I could not confirm from a source I read that it reaches the old lookout ground, and none says whether the site is open to visitors.

  1. Little Black Rock Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/little-black-rock-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Little Black Rock Fire Lookout Cabin, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/littleblackrock.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Little Black Rock, Oregon Lookouts (Forest Lookouts), https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/little-black-rock.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Little Black Rock Trail, canibikehere.com, https://www.canibikehere.com/trail/oregon/umpqua/little-black-rock (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Little Black Rock Lookout 1930 - 1966
Little Black Rock Lookout 1930 - 1966 (1930)Photo: Howard Verschoor collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Little Black Rock Lookout site 2007
Little Black Rock Lookout site 2007 (2007)Photo: Ron Kemnow, 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, 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, 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

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