“As one of the pioneer forests, the Sierra National Forest gave birth to a variety of fire lookouts in the early 1900’s.”
Sierra Centennial by Gene Rose
“Once there were 8000 fire lookouts across the United States, but now only 2000 remain. Of these, 600 are in active use for fire detection, and 100 of these are staffed by volunteers.”
Forest Fire Lookout Association, www.firelookout.org
Mount Tom Lookout and Communication Site 2009
Music Mountain Lookout and Communication Site 2006
One hundred years ago, the lonely Fire Lookout stood guard, elevated over the horizon, ready to spot the smoke of destruction. But these icons of firefighting are no longer the King of the Mountain. The landscape is giving rise to new modern towers with a different perspective and a contemporary mission: telecommunications.
Today, the old historic fire lookouts are sharing the mountaintops with an extensive technological assemblage of new structures: lattice tower structures, mono-pole towers, solar power systems, back-up generators, grounding systems, propane tanks, access ways, parking areas, low-power two-way radios, remote automated weather stations, internet service providers, snow making apparatus, U.S. Geological Service seismic equipment, storage buildings, broadcast translators, repeaters, cellular phone electronics, fences, gates, cables, conduits, full power FM radio transmitters, and portable toilets.
Music Mountain Lookout and Communication Site 2006
The social landscape laid upon our earthen terrain is shifting. These metaphors of the High Sierra mountians us to ask questions about our changing landscape, the demise of the old and the inception of the new. Is it better, is it bad, is it new, or is it just different? What is happening to us with the decay of our fire lookouts and the rise in electronic sites? What is passing away? What is transforming on our mountaintops?
Mount Tom Lookout and Communication Site 2009
I’ve been to a number of lookout sites, some with the building intact, and some with only lightning-blasted remains (even while the newer installations are maintained). A piece of infrastructure that is usually not noticed at these places is the USGS triangulation station that inhabits most sites along with the putative tower. Actually, that is a little incorrect: where they are noticed they have commonly been torn out, presumably as a valuable-looking souvenir (I’ve had to replace a few). In the larger scale of things (mapping, monitoring the earth’s changing shape) they may be more important than the lookouts themselves, though less honorable, I suppose.
Another item that resides on mountaintops, and more often those without towers, are the “visitor cairns”, often consisting of a metal box containing paper and pencil, that is used by those who venture to the top to record their wraithlike passage. I met a guy last summer in Kings Canyon who claimed he had been to one that contained John Muir’s name, although one could detect a fair amount of the blowhard in his other conversation. Still it is possible.
The stories of mountaintops inhabit the margins of history, though they often loom large in mythology: certainly no one can deny their continuing attraction for some of us, whether you drive or hike there.
Comment by Howard — December 4, 2009 @ 2:54 pm