Former fire lookouts a tool for tourism

As the Libby area continues an effort to capitalize on tourism, one of the tools in that box shares Libby’s rich timber history and sprawling mountain ranges with tourists looking to get above the skyline.

The Kootenai National Forest Service has rented out forest fire lookout towers since the early 1980s. Locations like the Big Creek Baldy lookout tower, built 41 feet in the air, provide visitors with a view of the dense Kootenai Forest from the same view that forest rangers would use decades ago when surveying the land for forest fires.

Mary Laws, recreation project manager for the Kootenai National Forest, said that instead of tearing these old structures down, the forest service has been able to transition these lookouts from fire safety tools to recreational assets.

“With aerial detectors and other means, we don’t have much use for lookout towers anymore,” Laws said. “Most of them weren’t being used and some had packrats moving in. Luckily, we were able to add them to our recreation program and put them on the cabin rental program.”

Laws said several lookouts were constructed in the area during the 1930s and 1950s. Forest service rangers would post up in these lookouts for days, looking out over the mountain vistas on alert for new fires starting up within sight.

The original Big Creek Baldy site had a log cabin, constructed in 1928. The cabin still stands, but a lookout tower was constructed nearby in 1934, about 55 feet off the ground, by Stef Ludvikson, who also built the cabin six years earlier. That structure was removed in 1967 and replaced with the current structure the same year. About 20 years later, in 1984, the lookout was put on the rental program administered by the Kootenai National Forest service. In 2000, the lookout was accepted into the National Lookout Register, making it a historic site recognized by the Forest Service. Today, the structure is powered by propane and contains two beds.

Some lookouts are still active, including the Blue Mountain lookout north of Libby, and are not available for rent.

Laws said the Big Creek Baldy lookout is one of the most popular lookout rentals in the area for tourists during the summer. In order for a lookout to be added to the recreation and rental program, the site must first undergo an archeological process to document the history of the lookout and then pass a safety evaluation for visitors. Groups like the Northwest Montana Chapter of the Forest Fire Lookout Association completes these procedures, Laws said, establishing the lookouts for recreation so they can remain on National Forest lands.

“All of the history and the local connections… We have a lot of old diaries up in the lookouts from people that stayed there,” Laws said.

Libby Chamber of Commerce President Jim Hayes said he believes tourism is Libby’s new hope for economic development.

“We don’t have anything else left,” Hayes said.

Hayes recreational assets, like former forest fire lookouts, help the community attract tourists to the area, where they can also spend money at local businesses.

“It’s one of those unique things we have here,” he said. “People come up for these and they get to see Montana for the first time.”

Hayes himself has spent time at different lookouts, including the Mount Henry and Gem Peak lookouts.

“It’s just another part of the history of the community with a little different twist on things,” Laws said. “Not every forest has lookouts and not all lookouts are rentals. It’s a niche that we can fill.”

For rental information, visit www.fs.usda.gov/activity/kootenai/recreation.

Reporter Seaborn Larson may be reached at 758-4441 or by email at slarson@dailyinterlake.com.