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Fire lookout · Umatilla County, Oregon

Meacham Lookout Site

Built 1937 as a 20-ft L-4 pole tower in the Umatilla National Forest; now gone, and no source describes the site today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. The register and firelookout.org say the tower is gone; the Oregon index says removed. No source gives a removal year.

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 tower20-ft L-4 pole towerThe design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Built
1937
Height
Unknown
Elevation
3,698 ft (1,127 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Umatilla County, Oregon
Coordinates
45.50654, −118.42134
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-meacham

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 3.8 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. 1937 BuiltBuilt in 1937 as a 20-foot L-4 pole tower, per the Former Fire Lookout Sites register.Source: firetower.org
  2. No record between 1937 and 2011
  3. 2011 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered on the Former Fire Lookout Sites register on August 20, 2011, nominated by Ray Kresek.Source: firetower.org
  4. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. When it came down is not recorded.

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.

The Meacham lookout stood in the Umatilla National Forest in Umatilla County, Oregon, and the Forest Service administered it.1 The Former Fire Lookout Sites register numbers it US 1127 and dates its construction to 1937.1 It describes the tower as a 20-foot L-4 pole tower.1

The register states plainly that the tower is now gone.1 The firelookout.org listing for Oregon marks the tower gone under the same register number.2 The Oregon forest-lookout index places the site at 1S-37E-17 and marks it removed.3 The register entry itself dates from August 20, 2011, with Ray Kresek named as nominator.1

The register's description is the fullest entry I found, and it ties the 1937 build to the tower's present absence.1 No source I found describes remains at the site, its view, or whether the ground is open to the public.

  1. Meacham Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/meacham-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Lookouts in Oregon, firelookout.org, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/or/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Meacham - Forest Lookouts, Oregon Lookouts, https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/meacham.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, 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. 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
  4. 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.