AUGUST 2015 • VOL 13, ISSUE 8 THANKS TO OUR ADVERTISERS, IT’S STILL…
NORTHWEST
THE MOUNT ADAMS SUMMIT FIRE LOOKOUT—A HURCULEAN FEAT
ere in the Northwest, folks who dedicate their lives to preventing forest fires are passionate about their calling. After all, they’re also protecting our homes, recreation areas, livelihoods, and lives, not to mention flora, fauna and scenic beauty. Those who choose to staff isolated fire lookouts are especially driven, opting to forego human contact, personal safety and many creature comforts for months at a time. And the optimal locations for lookout stations are usually about as far away from anything as you can get—one station in particular may not have been at the end of the earth, but you could probably see it from there. The June 1918 issue of Timberman magazine described herculean efforts by the U.S. Forest Service to build and staff a lookout station on top of Mt. Adams. Not in the foothills surrounding the mountain, not on a shoulder or flank of the mountain, but on the summit itself. “The North Pacific district of the Forest Service will this summer construct a fire lookout house on the topmost peak of Mt. Adams, at an elevation of 12,307 feet. This building, which will be the residence of a forest service employe during the three months of greatest fire danger in the forests, can be MAIN PHOTO:
Wow!
What a view!
The Best of the Pacific Northwest!
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SW WASHINGTON HISTORY BY KAREN L. JOHNSON
placed well up in the list of human habitations at greatest heights…. “The work of transporting the four tons of building material to the top of Mt. Adams was begun last summer as soon as the snow pack was in condition for packing, and when the approaching winter turned the snow fields to blue ice which could not be traversed with safety the lumber and other material was cached a mile and a half from the peak and left. “The boards, cut to short lengths, with the other material, was freighted by wagons 70 miles to a point where it was transferred to mule back. Another transfer took it on the backs of human packers to the bottom of the snow line and there it was loaded on sleds. “By a long piece of heavy telephone wire running over a pulley wheel two sleds were arranged as counterweights. The loaded sled was drawn up the mountain by two men who pulled on the descending sled. Over each distance, ranging from an eighth to three-eighths of a mile according to the terrain, trip after trip was made until all the material had been transported. Then the pulley wheel was carried to a new height FIRE—cont’d on page 2
From the summit of Mt. Adams, the still-buried lookout station oversees an infinity of foothills. The gaily decorated post sports flags and bandanas left by mountain climbers. photo courtesy loomisadventures.com INSET: In a low-snowpack year, nearly the entire lookout station is visible. The original 12 x 12 structure is at the left. To the right are two lean-to’s tacked on by sulfur miners in the 1930s. photo courtesy national historic lookout register.