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Fire lookout · Fall River County, South Dakota

Parker Peak Lookout Site

Fall River County Forest Service lookout above Minnekahta; register dates it 1943 (other sources say 1940 or 1941); removed in the 1970s and listed as gone.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Removed in the 1970s per the FFLOS register; the statewide list shows it gone.

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. No source found says whether the site is open to visitors.

Road to the top?
Unknown

Facts

Status
Gone
Type
Cab on a tower20-foot treated timber L-4 towerThe design: L-4
Built of
Not recorded
Built
1943
Height
20 ft (6.1 m)
Elevation
4,819 ft (1,469 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Fall River County, South Dakota
Coordinates
43.39824, −103.69136
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-sd-parker-peak

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 3.9 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. 1939 EventNewspaper item says one tower 'will be placed on Parker peak, probably next year'Source: westlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1940 EventNovember 1940 item lists a new station on the Harney forest at Parker Mountain; firelookout.com gives 1940 as the build yearSources: westlookouts.weebly.com, firelookout.com
  3. 1943 BuiltRegister and July 1943 newspaper item: station completed July 10; SummitPost caption says 1941Sources: firetower.org, westlookouts.weebly.com
  4. 1943 First staffedDoreen Miller, daughter of a Minnekahta familySources: firetower.org, westlookouts.weebly.com
  5. 1946 StaffedHoward & Hazel Taylor, per firelookout.comSource: firelookout.com
  6. 1955 StaffedGayle Dryden, 1955 to 1957, per firelookout.comSource: firelookout.com
  7. 1963 StaffedRay Norman, per firelookout.comSource: firelookout.com
  8. 1970 RemovedRegister Removed field reads 1970s; story says 1970s; 1970 is a sorting placeholderSource: firetower.org
  9. No record between 1970 and 2026
  10. 2026 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered January 1, 2026Source: firetower.org
  11. 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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

The Parker Peak lookout stood directly above Minnekahta, in Fall River County on the Black Hills National Forest.1,2 The register dates it to 1943, based on a July 1943 Lead Daily Call item, quoted on a lookout history site, that reported the station was completed on July 10.1,2 Firelookout.com instead gives 1940 and describes a 20-foot treated timber tower.3 A November 1940 newspaper item listed a new station on the Harney forest at Parker Mountain, and a 2013 SummitPost photo caption gives 1941.2,4

The first person to work the tower was Doreen Miller, daughter of a Minnekahta family.1,2 Later names on firelookout.com's staff list are Howard and Hazel Taylor in 1946, Gayle Dryden from 1955 to 1957, and Ray Norman in 1963.3

The register says the tower was removed in the 1970s.1 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's statewide list marks the site as gone.5 The register added the site on January 1, 2026.1

A SummitPost photo caption from 2013 places the old tower on the north end of the peak, which lies near Highway 18 southwest of Hot Springs, and calls the spot "the site of the ill-fated fire tower."4 No source describes what remains there today, or whether visitors can reach it.

  1. Parker Peak Lookout Site, Former Fire Lookout Sites, http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/sd/parker-peak-lookout-site/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Parker Peak, Forest Lookouts (quoting period newspaper items, 1939 to 1961), https://westlookouts.weebly.com/parker-peak.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Parker Peak Fire Lookout Tower, Rex's Fire Lookout Page, https://www.firelookout.com/sd/parkerpeak.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Parker Peak in the southern Black Hills, SummitPost, https://www.summitpost.org/parker-peak-in-the-southern-black-hills/873773 (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  5. South Dakota Lookouts, Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/sd/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

U.S. Forest Service photo
U.S. Forest Service photoPhoto: Dixie Boyle, via Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org) · All rights reserved · 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.

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, register numbers, agency, ownership, dates, photos, 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 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: 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: links 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. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, access, 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.