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Fire lookout · Fayette County, Pennsylvania

Sugarloaf Tower Site

Fayette County, PA steel Aermotor tower on Sugar Loaf mountain in Ohiopyle State Park, built 1921 and removed 1979 per sources; two online references conflict but confirm no standing tower.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. FFLOS says no longer standing; Forest Lookouts gives removal in 1979. A map landmark label and a video title still use the name; neither was confirmed to show a standing structure

Visit & stay

Gone: site only. The lookout no longer stands, so there is nothing to climb or rent. You may still be able to visit the site.

Access

Open to the public. Sugarloaf Knob, inside Ohiopyle State Park, is reached by a park road to just below the summit (Wikipedia). No source says the former tower site is open or what remains there

Road to the top?
Unknown

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a towersteel Aermotor towerThe design: Aermotor
Built of
Steel
Built
1921
Height
Unknown
Elevation
2,923 ft (891 m)
Agency
Unknown
Land
Unknown
Location
Fayette County, Pennsylvania
Coordinates
39.83202, −79.43448
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-pa-sugarloaf

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 3.6 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. 1921 BuiltFFLOS: steel Aermotor tower built in 1921; 1921 newspaper calls it the new forest fire towerSources: firetower.org, easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1921 FireWatchman spotted smoke from a brush-heap fire some ten miles away; fire wardens located it quickly (newspaper item dated October 28, 1921)Source: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  3. 1921 StaffedWatchman on duty continuously at the new tower, living in a cabin at its foot; four-mile telephone extension to the towerSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  4. No record between 1921 and 1979
  5. 1979 RemovedForest Lookouts lists 1979: RemovedSource: easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  6. No record between 1979 and 2008
  7. 2008 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered September 16, 2008; nominated by Henry IsenbergSource: firetower.org
  8. TodayGoneThe lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left.

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 10 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Sugarloaf fire tower stood on Sugar Loaf mountain in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, in what is now Ohiopyle State Park.1,2

The Former Fire Lookout Sites register calls it a steel Aermotor tower built in 1921, and gives its elevation as 2,923 feet (891 meters).1 A 1921 newspaper item, reprinted on the Forest Lookouts site, says the new tower overlooks nearly three-quarters of Fayette County's forestry area.2

A watchman worked around the clock, lodging in a cabin at the base, and a four-mile telephone line ran out to the tower.2 In late October 1921 the watchman saw smoke from a brush-heap fire about ten miles off, raised the alarm with the wardens, and they pinpointed it fast.2

The Forest Lookouts list gives the tower's removal as 1979.2 The register says it is no longer standing.1 Two online items still use the name: a map of Ohiopyle lists a Sugarloaf Fire Tower as a landmark, and a video is titled Exploring Historic Abandoned Sugarloaf Fire tower.3,4 We could not confirm from either that a structure stands, so the removal record remains the working answer.

Sugarloaf Knob, a well-known summit in Ohiopyle State Park at the southern end of Laurel Ridge, can be approached by a park road that ends just short of the top, then a brief off-trail climb through brush.5 No source we read describes what remains at the tower site today, or whether it sits on that summit.

  1. Sugarloaf Tower Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/pa/sugarloaf-tower-site/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Sugar Loaf Mountain, Forest Lookouts, https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/sugar-loaf-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. 2010 Map of Ohiopyle, PA, Pastmaps, https://pastmaps.com/map/ohiopyle-fayette-county-pa-us-topo-2010 (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Exploring Historic Abandoned Sugarloaf Fire tower, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qt_x2UIzN9U (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  5. Sugarloaf Knob, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugarloaf_Knob (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, type, what it is built of, status, register numbers, 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
  2. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, status, access, staffing, 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.