FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Crook County, Oregon

Tower Point Lookout

Tower Point, Ochoco National Forest, Oregon: a lookout site since 1919, with the present 20-ft timber L-4 tower built 1955; registered 2022, unstaffed on a 2021 visit.

Visit & stay

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

Access

Restricted access

Access is seasonal, gated or needs a permit. Check before you go. Reached by forest roads. On a June 2021 visit the catwalk hatch was latched shut and the cab could not be reached. Check with the Ochoco National Forest before visiting.

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
Yes, you can drive up
Trail
Forest roads 1750 and 1760 from Road 16 to the summit; a 2021 visitor found the road a bit rough but very doable and noted the last stretch had no gate.
Staffing
Staffed during fire season

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a tower20-foot open treated timber tower with an L-4 cabThe design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Height
20 ft (6.1 m)
Elevation
6,090 ft (1,856 m)
Agency
US Forest Service, Ochoco National Forest; Bureau of Land Management a cooperator
Land
Federal land
Location
Crook County, Oregon
Coordinates
44.05713, −120.29570
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-or-tower-point

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 3.7 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. 1919 BuiltFirst lookout tower and telephone line to Tower Point, per a Crook County Journal item of Sept. 4, 1919 quoted by the Oregon listing; NHLR gives 1919 as the start of fire detection at the siteSources: nhlr.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  2. No record between 1919 and 1936
  3. 1936 BuiltL-4 cab dated 1936 by the Oregon listing only; NHLR and Rex's page do not give this dateSource: oregonlookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1940 Replaced by a new structureA timber tower erected at the siteSources: nhlr.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com, firelookout.com
  5. No record between 1940 and 1955
  6. 1955 BuiltPresent 20-foot treated timber L-4 tower builtSources: nhlr.org, oregonlookouts.weebly.com, firelookout.com
  7. No record between 1955 and 2021
  8. 2021 EventVisited June 12, 2021: unstaffed when the visitor arrived; catwalk hatch latched shutSource: cherylhill.net
  9. 2022 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered July 6, 2022 as US 1644, OR 162Source: 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.

Tower Point's story starts in 1919. A September 1919 item in the Crook County Journal says C. W. Goodnight was assisting Ranger Anderson with a lookout tower and telephone line in the Maury district, at Tower Point.1 The National Historic Lookout Register dates the start of fire detection at the site to 1919, and says a timber tower went up there in 1940.2 The present tower is a 20-foot treated timber structure with an L-4 cab, built in 1955.2,3

Sources disagree about the cab. The Oregon forest lookouts listing describes the 1955 tower as carrying a 1936 L-4 cab.1 The register gives 1955 for the tower and does not date a separate cab.2

Rex's Forest Fire Lookout Page says the tower has a lookout on duty every summer.3 When a visitor came in June 2021, it was unstaffed.4 A trailer with a generator sat on site, and the visitor guessed that staffing would start soon.4 The same visitor noted four lookouts once stood in the Maury Mountains, with Tower Point the lone survivor.4

The National Historic Lookout Register recorded the tower on July 6, 2022, as US 1644, OR 162. It lists the Ochoco National Forest as administrator, with the Bureau of Land Management as a cooperator.2

The site is reached by forest roads.4 The 2021 visitor drove from Road 16 along roads 1750 and 1760 to the summit, found them rough in places but manageable, and noted that the last stretch had no gate.4 The tower is about 32 miles southeast of Prineville.3

On that visit the visitor climbed the steps as far as possible, but the catwalk hatch was fastened shut, so the cab was out of reach that day.4 Check with the Ochoco National Forest before you go, and do not climb a tower that is closed.

  1. Tower Point, Forest Lookouts (Oregon listing), https://oregonlookouts.weebly.com/tower-point.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  2. Tower Point Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/or/tower-point-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  3. Tower Point Fire Lookout Tower, Rex's Forest Fire Lookout Page, https://www.firelookout.com/or/towerpoint.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  4. Tower Point, Every Lookout in Oregon, Cheryl Hill, http://cherylhill.net/firelookouts/2021/06/16/tower-point/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩

Photos

Tower Point Lookout - 2021
Tower Point Lookout - 2021 (2021)Photo: Cheryl Hill, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Tower Point L.O.
Tower Point L.OPhoto: Rex Kamstra and Melinda Martin, via firelookout.com · source
Tower Point in 2024
Tower Point in 2024 (2024)Photo: Rex Kamstra and Melinda Martin, via firelookout.com · source

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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.

    • NHLR: 1955
    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 1940
    • Every Lookout in Oregon (Cheryl Hill): 1955

    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, ownership, 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: design, staffing, 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) Gave us: height 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) 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, 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.