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Fire lookout · Perry County, Tennessee

Beardstown Lookout Tower

Also known as Lobelville

Perry County, TN steel Aermotor tower built about 1950 for the state forestry division; in use to the early 1970s; a 2018 photo exists, but a Lobelville tower list entry says removed.

Status unknown: We do not know yet whether it still stands. Last dated evidence is a March 2018 photo on the Register; a Tennessee tower list marks a Lobelville tower in Perry County as removed, and the sources do not show whether that is this tower

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
Status unknown sources disagree
Type
Cab on a towersteel Aermotor tower, about 73 ft tall (model not stated)The design: Aermotor
Built of
Steel
Built
1950
Height
73 ft (22.3 m)
Elevation
823 ft (251 m)
Agency
Tennessee Division of Forestry
Land
Unknown
Location
Perry County, Tennessee
Coordinates
35.75431, −87.84531
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-tn-beardstown

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.

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Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1950 BuiltConstructed around 1950 (Register 'Built' field 1950)Source: nhlr.org
  2. No record between 1950 and 2014
  3. 2014 EventA Lobelville tower in Perry County is listed as extant in the National Register study as of March 26, 2014; identity with Beardstown not confirmedSource: npgallery.nps.gov
  4. 2018 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered April 3, 2018 as US 1272, TN 31; nominated by Andrew T. LutesSource: nhlr.org
  5. TodayStatus unknownWe do not know whether it still stands.

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 Register places the Beardstown Lookout Tower in Perry County, Tennessee, at an elevation of 823 feet (251 meters).1

The Register says the tower was built around 1950 and is administered by the Tennessee Division of Forestry.1 Its height is about 73 feet, and the structure is steel, of Aermotor make.1 The Register does not say why it went up. A National Register study of the division's fire towers says the Aermotor LS-40 design was widely used by the division until the mid-1970s.2 We could not tell from the sources whether Beardstown is that model.

According to the Register, its use ran through the early 1970s.1 We found no notable fires tied to it.

The tower's later fate is unclear. A Tennessee lookout-tower list names a Lobelville tower in Perry County and marks it as removed.3 The National Register study lists a Lobelville tower in Perry County among the towers still standing on March 26, 2014.2 The sources do not show whether either entry describes the Beardstown tower. The Register's photo of the tower is dated March 2018.1

We found no public access information for the site. The Register notes that two modern communications towers share the ground.1 Anyone interested should ask the Tennessee Division of Forestry before going there.

  1. Beardstown Lookout Tower, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/tn/beardstown-lookout-tower/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Tennessee Division of Forestry Fire Lookout Towers, 1933 to 1975, National Register of Historic Places multiple property document, National Park Service, https://npgallery.nps.gov/pdfhost/docs/NRHP/Text/64501237.pdf (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Tennessee Lookout Towers, tnlandforms.us, https://tnlandforms.us/towers/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Photos

March 2018 photo
March 2018 photo (2018)Photo: Andrew T. Lutes, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source

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Where sources disagree

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  • Sources disagree on whether it still stands.

    • Firefinder research: Status unknown
    • NHLR: Standing
    • tnlandforms.us fire lookout towers (Tom Dunigan) -- GA, NC, TN: Gone

    Research (2026-10-09) gives unknown where the source records give standing. The page shows the researched status; please tell us if it is wrong.

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. tnlandforms.us fire lookout towers (Tom Dunigan) -- GA, NC, TN Gave us: links tnlandforms.us (Tom Dunigan) · No licence stated; facts only (coordinates, county, elevation, NGS/GFC/BLL register cross-references, status where given). · retrieved 4 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.