Fire lookout · Clackamas County, Oregon
North Mountain Lookout SIte
Mount Hood NF site in Clackamas County: a 1933 20-foot L-4 wooden tower, replaced in 1965 by a 41-foot R-6 tower; both sources list it as gone.
- Gone
- Access unknown
- Verified
Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Both the register and firelookout.com list the lookout as gone; neither gives a removal date
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
- Type
- Cab on a tower20-foot wooden tower with an L-4 cab (1933); replaced in 1965 by a 41-foot treated timber tower with an R-6 cabThe designs: L-4, R-6
- Built of
- Not recorded
- Built
- 1933
- Height
- Unknown
- Elevation
- 4,064 ft (1,239 m)
- Agency
- Mount Hood National Forest
- Land
- Federal land
- Location
- Clackamas County, Oregon
- Coordinates
- 45.38652, −121.94075 sources disagree
- Registers
- This entry
- VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
- Firefinder id
us-or-north-mountain
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
- 1933 Built20-foot wooden tower with an L-4 cab, the first structure on the siteSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
- No record between 1933 and 1965
- 1965 Replaced by a new structure41-foot treated timber tower with an R-6 cab replaced the 1933 towerSources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
- No record between 1965 and 2019
- 2019 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterDate registered per FFLOS detail page: September 18, 2019Source: FFLOS register entry
- 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 (opens another site) (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).
Story
Researched 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.
North Mountain was a fire lookout site in Clackamas County, Oregon, inside the Mount Hood National Forest.1 The first structure was a 20-foot wooden tower with an L-4 cab, built in 1933.1,2 The register lists the site at 4,064 feet (1,239 meters) under number US 1760, OR 505.1
Both sources place emergency use of the lookout in the 1960s.1,2
In 1965 the wooden tower was replaced by a 41-foot treated timber tower with an R-6 cab.1,2 Both sources now list the lookout as gone.1,2 The Forest Fire Lookout Association added the site to its register on September 18, 2019.1
No source describes what, if anything, is left at the site today.
- North Mountain Lookout Site, Forest Fire Lookout Association, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/or/north-mountain-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
- North Mtn. Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/northmtn.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 1.5 km (1.0 mi).
- FFLOS: 45.38652, −121.94075
- FFLA: 45.39689, −121.95369
- firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 45.39689, −121.95369
They share a register number.
The map uses the position from FFLOS.
Sources
- Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) (opens another site) 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
- Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists (opens another site) 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
- firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page (opens another site) 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
- FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) (opens another site) 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
- 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
- FFLOS register entry US 1760 (firetower.org) (opens another site)
- FFLA Oregon lookout list (firelookout.org) (opens another site)
- North Mtn. on firelookout.com (Rex Kamstra) (opens another site)
- North Mountain on Forest Lookouts, western US (Ron Kemnow) (opens another site)
Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.