FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Luzerne County, Pennsylvania

Grandview Lookout

Steel fire tower in Ricketts Glen State Park, Luzerne County; the register dates it 1942 and 100 ft, a story map 1979 and 80 ft.

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. Not open to the public, per the register; staffed during fire season.

Can you climb it?
Unknown
Road to the top?
Unknown
Trail
A 2019 visitor guide says the Grandview Trail leads out to the site, where it describes an abandoned fire tower.
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Cab on a towerSteel tower with an Aermotor builder plateThe design: Aermotor
Built of
Steel
Height
80 ft (24.4 m)
Elevation
2,448 ft (746 m)
Agency
Pennsylvania Bureau of Forestry
Land
State land
Location
Luzerne County, Pennsylvania
Coordinates
41.30856, −76.30930
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 8 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-pa-grandview

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. 1942 BuiltRegister build year for a 100-foot steel tower. The story map gives 1979.Source: nhlr.org
  2. No record between 1942 and 2022
  3. 2022 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered May 22, 2022 as NHLR US 1580Source: nhlr.org
  4. 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.

Grandview is a steel fire tower inside Ricketts Glen State Park in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.1 The Bureau of Forestry is listed as its administrator.1

The register says the tower was built in 1942 and is 100 feet tall. It also notes an Aermotor builder plate photographed in 2018.1 A story map of Pennsylvania's fire towers gives a different account: it dates the tower to 1979, names the Aermotor Windmill Company as builder, and puts the height at 80 feet.2 The two sources disagree on both the year and the height. I could not find a third source to settle it, so the build date should be treated as open.

The register says the tower is closed to the public, though staff are posted there during fire season. It also says three states and 11 counties can be seen from the tower in clear weather.1 A 2019 visitor guide says the Grandview Trail leads to the spot Ricketts chose for a lookout, and that an abandoned fire tower now stands there. It adds that views are not easy to get, with much of the area grown in.3 If the guide's abandoned tower is this one, the two sources disagree about whether it is still in use.1,3

The register added Grandview to the National Historic Lookouts Register on May 22, 2022.1 Wikipedia's Red Rock Mountain article carries a photo captioned as a view from a fire tower, gives the peak's coordinates almost exactly where our record places the lookout, and gives the peak an elevation of 2,449 feet.4 I did not find accounts of notable fires or smokes from this tower in the sources I read.

Because the register does not list the tower as open to visitors, do not climb it.1 Check with the park office or the Bureau of Forestry before visiting.

  1. Grandview Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/pa/grandview-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  2. Fire Towers of Pennsylvania, ArcGIS story map, https://www.arcgis.com/sharing/rest/content/items/ed47c97ebe7246868ce8ef3e7139a0b4/data?f=json (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  3. Ricketts Glen State Park Guide: Epic Waterfall Hike, Camping, & More, Interesting Pennsylvania, https://www.interestingpennsylvania.com/2019/09/ricketts-glen-state-park-waterfalls-hiking.html (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩
  4. Red Rock Mountain, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Rock_Mountain (accessed 2026-10-08). ↩

Photos

March 2018 photo
March 2018 photo (2018)Photo: Mark Haughwout, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
March 2018 photo
March 2018 photo (2018)Photo: Mark Haughwout, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Aermotor builder plate in March 2018
Aermotor builder plate in March 2018 (2018)Photo: Mark Haughwout, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Grandview Tower
Grandview TowerPhoto: Shawn Lesitsky -- PA Fire Towers StoryMap (Esri ArcGIS StoryMaps) · source
Photo of Grandview Lookout
Photo: Nicholas, via Wikimedia Commons · CC BY 2.0 · 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.

    • NHLR: 1942
    • Fire Towers of Pennsylvania (ArcGIS StoryMap, Shawn Lesitsky): 1979

    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, type, what it is built of, status, 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. Fire Towers of Pennsylvania (ArcGIS StoryMap, Shawn Lesitsky) Gave us: design, height, ownership, photos, links Pennsylvania fire towers StoryMap (ArcGIS) · No licence stated; facts only (county, agency, built year, height, builder). · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  3. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- eastern US (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) Gave us: links easternuslookouts.weebly.com · No licence stated; facts only (county, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, status, height, design hints, register links). The site's own historical quotes, newspaper citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  4. Wikidata -- US fire lookout towers (Q748998 and subclasses) Gave us: photos, links Wikidata · CC0 1.0 (Wikidata). Images keep their own Commons licence/credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  5. OpenStreetMap -- fire lookout structures Gave us: access, links © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0. (c) OpenStreetMap contributors. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  6. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, 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.