FirefinderFire lookouts of the US

Fire lookout · Lewis County, Washington

Lookout Mountain Lookout Site (GPNF)

Also known as Lookout Mountain

Wooden L-4 tower built 1932 on Lookout Mountain, Lewis County, WA; removed or destroyed 1968; sources disagree on the forest; no site description found.

Gone: The lookout no longer stands. Only the site is left. Removed in 1968 per the register; firelookout.com says destroyed in 1968.

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 tower10-foot wooden L-4 tower (register and firelookout.com)The design: L-4
Built of
Wood
Built
1932
Height
10 ft (3.0 m)
Elevation
5,475 ft (1,669 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Lewis County, Washington
Coordinates
46.71531, −121.77680
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 9 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-wa-lookout-mountain-gpnf

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 4.0 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. 1932 Built10-foot wooden L-4 tower (height as given by the register)Sources: firetower.org, firelookout.com
  2. No record between 1932 and 1968
  3. 1968 Destroyedfirelookout.com says destroyedSource: firelookout.com
  4. 1968 RemovedRegister says the tower was removedSource: firetower.org
  5. No record between 1968 and 2012
  6. 2012 Added to the Former Fire Lookout Sites RegisterRegistered May 26, 2012 as US 1281, WA 181; nominated by Ray KresekSource: 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 9 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Lookout Mountain rises to 5,475 feet in Lewis County, Washington, about 10 miles south of Mount Rainier.1,2 The register gives the tower's height as 10 feet and calls it a wooden L-4 tower, built in 1932.1,2

Sources disagree about the forest. The register and firelookout.com place the site in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, while an index on washingtonlookouts.weebly.com lists it under the Snoqualmie National Forest.1,2,3 The register names the U.S. Forest Service as the administering agency.1

The tower was gone by 1968. The register says it was removed that year, and firelookout.com says it was destroyed.1,2 The Forest Fire Lookout Association's regional list also marks the tower as gone.4

The sources say nothing about what, if anything, remains at the site today, or whether the site is open to visitors.1,2,3,4

  1. Lookout Mountain Lookout Site (GPNF), Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (firetower.org), http://firetower.org/lookouts/us/wa/lookout-mountain-lookout-site-gpnf/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  2. Lookout Mtn. Fire Lookout Tower, firelookout.com, https://www.firelookout.com/wa/lookoutmtn136.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  3. Lookout Mountain - FOREST LOOKOUTS, washingtonlookouts.weebly.com, https://washingtonlookouts.weebly.com/lookout-mountain3.html (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩
  4. Washington Lookouts (by Region), Forest Fire Lookout Association, https://firelookout.org/lookouts/us/wa/wa-rg/ (accessed 2026-10-09). ↩

Sources

  1. Former Fire Lookout Sites Register (FFLOS) Gave us: name, location, county, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, ownership, 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 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, 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.