FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Jackson County, Oregon

Table Mountain Lookout

First lookout placed 1930 or 1931 (sources differ); current 30-foot tower built 1958; staffed to at least 1975; abandoned, on private land with no public access.

Private land

No public access. Please do not trespass; view it only from public land. On private property with no public access, per the register and the firelookout.com listing; the 2026 standing list also marks it not accessible to the public.

Visit & stay

Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.

Access

Private land. See the warning at the top of this page.

Can you climb it?
No
Road to the top?
Unknown
Trail
Private property with no public access.
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a tower30-foot open timber tower with an R-6 flat-top cab (built 1958); the earlier 1931 structure was a 30-foot pole live-in towerThe design: R-6
Built of
Wood
Height
30 ft (9.1 m)
Elevation
6,113 ft (1,863 m)
Agency
Oregon Department of Forestry (Southwest Oregon District)
Land
Unknown
Location
Jackson County, Oregon
Coordinates
42.19817, −122.49265
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-table-mountain-2

View from the cab

What you see from the 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.

Downloads about 3.5 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 BuiltRegister: first lookout placed at Table Mountain by the Klamath National Forest. Conflicts with the 1931 date below.Source: nhlr.org
  2. 1931 BuiltWork started and the lookout developed in 1931; the Oregon Lookouts page credits the Crater National Forest.Sources: firelookout.com, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1933 EventFive men from the Moon Prairie CCC camp building a garage and woodshed at the station.Source: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  4. No record between 1933 and 1958
  5. 1958 Replaced by a new structureCurrent 30-foot timber tower with an R-6 flat-top cab constructed; the work was reported 97% complete.Sources: nhlr.org, firelookout.com, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  6. No record between 1958 and 1975
  7. 1975 StaffedRegister says staffed until at least 1975; the Klamath District of ODF operated the lookout that year while other lookouts were remodeled.Sources: nhlr.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  8. No record between 1975 and 2022
  9. 2022 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered on the National Historic Lookout Register as US 1643 on July 6, 2022.Source: nhlr.org
  10. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

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 8 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Table Mountain sits about 11 miles east of Ashland, in Jackson County, and its first lookout is dated two ways.1,2 The register dates the first lookout to 1930, credited to the Klamath National Forest.1 The firelookout.com page dates the development to 1931, with a 30-foot pole live-in tower.2 The Oregon Lookouts page also dates work to 1931, and it credits the Crater National Forest with the build.3

The current tower dates to 1958: a 30-foot open timber tower with a flat-top cab.1 The Oregon Lookouts page records the 1958 work as 97 percent complete, at a total cost of $4,656.73.3

In 1933 five men from the Moon Prairie CCC camp were putting up a garage and woodshed at the station.3 The register says a lookout staffed the site through at least 1975.1 That year the Klamath District of the Oregon Department of Forestry operated it while other lookouts were being remodeled.3

The firelookout.com page says the tower has been abandoned for many years.2 The 2026 statewide list of standing lookouts also marks it abandoned.4

Today the tower stands on private ground closed to the public, so it is not a place to visit.1,2,4

  1. Table Mountain Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/or/table-mountain-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  2. Table Mtn. Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/or/tablemtn65b.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  3. Table Mountain, Forest Lookouts (oregonlookouts.weebly.com), https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/table-mountain2.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  4. Oregon's Standing Lookouts, Every Lookout in Oregon, https://cherylhill.net/firelookouts/oregons-standing-lookouts/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩

Photos

Table Mountain Lookout - 2015
Table Mountain Lookout - 2015 (2015)Photo: Ron Kemnow, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Table Mountain Lookout - 1959
Table Mountain Lookout - 1959 (1959)Photo: Southwest District - Oregon Department of Forestry, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Table Mtn. in 2007
Table Mtn. in 2007 (2007)Photo: Ron Kemnow, via firelookout.com · 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.

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 year it was built.

    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 1931
    • Every Lookout in Oregon (Cheryl Hill): 1958

    Sources give different build years. Often one counts the first lookout on the site and another the structure there now.

Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, dates, photos, links National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.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: height, dates, photos, 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) 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. Every Lookout in Oregon (Cheryl Hill) Gave us: links Every Lookout in Oregon (Cheryl Hill, cherylhill.net) · No licence stated; facts only (name, agency, elevation, year built, design and height, status word, links). Posts' narrative and photos are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  6. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, access, 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.