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Fire lookout · Wallowa County, Oregon

Nesbit Butte Lookout Site

Wallowa-Whitman NF butte lookout near Enterprise: 30-foot wooden tower dated 1936, gone with no removal year; no source describes the summit today.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Register and firelookout.com both list it as gone; neither 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 tower30-foot wooden tower with a 14x14-foot cab (register); 30-foot wooden tower with an L-4 cab (firelookout.com)The design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Built
1936
Height
30 ft (9.1 m)
Elevation
6,044 ft (1,842 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service, Wallowa-Whitman National Forest
Land
Federal land
Location
Wallowa County, Oregon
Coordinates
45.17098, −116.97401
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-nesbit-butte

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 3.8 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. 1934 EventMay 1934 La Grande Evening Observer item describes a planned 30-foot tower and lookout house on Nesbit butteSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1935 EventHistory page lists panorama photos taken August 24, 1935Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1936 BuiltRegister and firelookout.com date the 30-foot wooden tower to 1936Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  4. 1937 EventUSFS survey disk stamped NESBIT BU LOT RM 1937 set in the concrete base of the southeast tower legSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1941 StaffedEdward Dmytryk listed as known lookout personnelSource: firelookout.com
  6. 1942 StaffedLesley Marks listed as known lookout personnelSource: firelookout.com
  7. 1947 StaffedRobert Thorner listed as known lookout personnelSource: firelookout.com
  8. No record between 1947 and 2011
  9. 2011 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: August 20, 2011Source: FFLOS register entry
  10. 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.

Nesbit Butte sits in the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest in Wallowa County, about 23 miles southeast of Enterprise.1,2

A May 1934 item in the La Grande Evening Observer described plans for a lookout house and a 30-foot tower on the butte.3 The register dates the lookout to 1936.2 The history page also lists panorama photos taken on August 24, 1935, and a Forest Service survey disk stamped 1937 was set in the concrete base of the southeast tower leg.3 The sources do not line up closely on the build year, but the register and firelookout.com both give 1936.2,1

firelookout.com lists known lookout personnel as Edward Dmytryk in 1941, Lesley Marks in 1942 and Robert Thorner in 1947.1

The register describes the 30-foot wooden tower as gone.2 firelookout.com also lists it as gone, and leaves the end date as a question mark.1

None of the sources says what, if anything, stands on the butte today. The register includes a 2008 photo of the site, credited to Ron Kemnow, but its caption does not say whether any structure is visible in it.2 We found nothing on whether the summit is open to visitors, so check with the Wallowa-Whitman National Forest before planning a trip.2

  1. Nesbit Butte Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/nesbitbutte.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Nesbit Butte Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites Register, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/nesbit-butte-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Nesbit Butte - FOREST LOOKOUTS, Rex's Fire Lookout Page, https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/nesbit-butte.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

Nesbit Butte Lookout
Nesbit Butte LookoutPhoto: Howard Verschoor collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Nesbit Butte Lookout
Nesbit Butte LookoutPhoto: Howard Verschoor collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Nesbit Butte Lookout
Nesbit Butte LookoutPhoto: Howard Verschoor collection, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source
Nesbit Butte Lookout site 2008
Nesbit Butte Lookout site 2008 (2008)Photo: Ron Kemnow, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · source

Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.

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: 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, 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

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.