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Fire lookout · Fulton County, Pennsylvania

Tuscarora Tower Site

Pennsylvania steel Aermotor tower on Tuscarora Mountain, built 1921 and removed 1978; no source describes what remains at the summit.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Removed in 1978; no source describes what remains at the summit today.

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
Gone
Type
Cab on a towersteel Aermotor towerThe design: Aermotor
Built of
Steel
Built
1921
Height
80 ft (24.4 m)
Elevation
Unknown
Agency
Pennsylvania Department of Forestry (built 1921); the land is now Buchanan State Forest
Land
State land
Location
Fulton County, Pennsylvania
Coordinates
39.91000, −77.95000 (approximate)
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-pa-tuscarora

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 its recorded height.

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 BuiltBuilt by the state in 1921; a September 1921 report said it was finished, about 80 feet from the ground.Sources: firetower.org, easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1921 Replaced by a new structureThe register entry for Big Knob says its 1914 tree tower was replaced by Tuscarora in 1921.Source: firetower.org
  3. No record between 1921 and 1978
  4. 1978 RemovedRemoved in 1978.Sources: firetower.org, easternuslookouts.weebly.com
  5. No record between 1978 and 2008
  6. 2008 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered September 16, 2008; nominated by Henry Isenberg.Source: firetower.org
  7. 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 Tuscarora lookout went up on Tuscarora Mountain in 1921, during a state program that ordered fifty steel fire towers.1,2 A June 1921 newspaper item said two of them were likely to be sited in Buchanan State Forest, and that a fire observer on this summit could see fires across a wide area.2 The register describes the tower as a steel Aermotor type, built in 1921.1 It replaced an earlier tree tower on Big Knob, built in 1914, according to the register entry for that site.3

An August 1921 notice listed it among the first eighteen towers to go up, and a September report said the state's steel tower was finished.2 That report put the lookout about eighty feet above the ground, on the mountaintop.2

The 1921 items disagree on the summit's height, giving 2,440 feet in June and 2,540 feet in September.2 They also differ from the register on the county.1,2 The register says Fulton, while the August notice says Franklin.1,2

Both the register and the lookout history site say the tower was removed in 1978.1,2

A 2016 state geology publication gives about 2,458 feet as the elevation of a Tower Road vista on Tuscarora Mountain, in Buchanan State Forest.4 The same publication places that vista in Franklin County, but it does not connect the spot to the old lookout.4 No source I read says what, if anything, remains of the tower today.1,2

  1. Tuscarora Tower Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites, Forest Fire Lookout Association (firetower.org), http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/pa/tuscarora-tower-site/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  2. Tuscarora, Forest Lookouts (easternuslookouts.weebly.com), https://easternuslookouts.weebly.com/tuscarora.html (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  3. Big Knob Tower Site (Fulton County), Former Fire Lookout Sites, Forest Fire Lookout Association (firetower.org), http://www.firetower.org/lookouts/us/pa/big-knob-tower-site-fulton-county/ (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩
  4. Outstanding Geologic Feature of Pennsylvania: Tower Road Vista, Franklin County, Pennsylvania Geological Survey (DCNR), https://elibrary.dcnr.pa.gov/PDFProvider.ashx?action=PDFStream&docID=1752619&revision=0&docName=TG16-108_GeoFeat_TowerRoadVista_FranklinCo&nativeExt=pdf&PromptToSave=False&Size=774388&ViewerMode=2&overlay=0 (accessed 2026-10-10). ↩

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, county, 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. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- eastern US (easternuslookouts.weebly.com) Gave us: location, agency, ownership, 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
  3. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, 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

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.