Fire lookout · Cameron County, Pennsylvania
Whitimore Tower
A 1921 Aermotor-built tower listed at 47 ft in Elk State Forest, Cameron County; one storymap entry is the only source for its history.
- Standing
- Access unknown
- Verified
Visit & stay
Not rentable. As far as we know, this lookout cannot be booked for overnight stays.
Access
Access unknown
We do not know the access rules. Check with the land manager before you go.
- Can you climb it?
- Unknown
- Road to the top?
- Unknown
- Staffing
- Unknown
Facts
- Status
- Type
- Cab on a towerBuilt by the Aermotor Windmill Company, per the storymap; no design details givenThe design: Aermotor
- Built of
- SteelGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
- Built
- 1921
- Height
- 47 ft (14.3 m)
- Elevation
- Unknown
- Agency
- Elk State Forest
- Land
- State land
- Location
- Cameron County, Pennsylvania
- Coordinates
- 41.48107, −78.26006
- Registers
- Not on a lookout register
- This entry
- VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
- Firefinder id
us-pa-whitimore
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 3.3 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
- 1915 EventLumber era in the area of Elk State Forest endedSource: en.wikipedia.org
- 1921 BuiltStorymap: built by Aermotor Windmill Company, 47 ft. Single source for this date.Source: arcgis.com
- 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 (opens another site) (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).
Story
Researched 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.
Whitimore Tower is in Elk State Forest, Cameron County.1 The storymap gives a build year of 1921, the Aermotor Windmill Company as builder, and a height of 47 feet.1 I found no second source for those details.
Wikipedia's entry on the Aermotor company says the firm also made galvanized steel fire lookouts under the name "Aermotor Corporation."2
Most of Elk State Forest's land was obtained from timber firms in the early 1900s, and the lumber era there ended in 1915.3 The same article says sparks from steam trains started fires that held back the forest's recovery after the lumber companies left.3 The sources I read do not connect this tower to any particular fire.
I found no staffing, access, or fire records for Whitimore in the sources I could open. Two listing pages that mention the tower, one on a trail site and one with a photo caption, were blocked when I tried to read them.
Ask the Elk State Forest office about access before you visit, and do not climb the tower unless it is open to the public.
- Fire Towers of Pennsylvania (story map data), ArcGIS StoryMaps, https://www.arcgis.com/sharing/rest/content/items/ed47c97ebe7246868ce8ef3e7139a0b4/data (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
- Aermotor Windmill Company, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aermotor_Windmill_Company (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
- Elk State Forest, Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elk_State_Forest (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
Photos
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.
Sources
- Fire Towers of Pennsylvania (ArcGIS StoryMap, Shawn Lesitsky) (opens another site) Gave us: name, location, county, type, what it is built of, design, height, status, agency, ownership, dates, photos, links Pennsylvania fire towers StoryMap (ArcGIS) · No licence stated; facts only (county, agency, built year, height, builder). · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
- 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
- Fire Towers of Pennsylvania (story map item data) (ArcGIS StoryMaps, Shawn Lesitsky) (opens another site)
- Aermotor Windmill Company (Wikipedia) (opens another site)
- Elk State Forest (Wikipedia) (opens another site)
- Fire Towers of Pennsylvania StoryMap (Shawn Lesitsky) (opens another site)
Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.