| Drive-In | Destroyed |
| Elevation: 5199′ | IDL / Coeur d’Alene Indian Reservation |
History
1934 – 50′ Pole tower with L-4 cab
1963 – 53′ Treated timber tower with R-6 flat cab
1970? – Last in service
1998 – Torn down
Known Staff
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1944
Mrs. Grace Shellman (Kellogg Evening News)
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1946
Lewis McFee (Kellogg Evening News - 07/01/1946)
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1948
Mr. & Mrs. Fred Davis (Kellogg Evening News)
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1952
Mr. & Mrs. Douglas Pierce (Kellogg Evening News)
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1953
Mr. & Mrs. Rodney Durton (Kellogg Evening News)
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1954
Mr. & Mrs. Carl Wentland (Kellogg Evening News)
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1957
Mr. & Mrs. Richard Lambert (The Coeur d'Alene Press - 07/18/1957)
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1961
George Goodson (Kellogg Evening News - 07/17/1961)
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1963
Leslie Hawkins (Kellogg Evening News)
- 1971
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1972
Unknown Female
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2016
Kerry Gauthier — Eagle Mountain opened for a partial season after a fire closed Hemlock Butte
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???
Ole Hilde (Shoshone News Press)
Know more about who staffed this tower, or when? Let us know.
Mark Grorud, who staffed Eagle Peak in 1971, was very kind to share some of his memories from his summer there:
I was assigned to Eagle Peak, a lookout about halfway between Cataldo and St. Maries, Idaho. I could drive up to the lookout, but it was fairly isolated. It was a 60-foot wooden tower. There was a natural spring about a mile down the road where I went to fill jerry cans with water. There were usually mountain lion tracks around the spring. Once a week, I went down to Pinehurst, where I got a nice bath at the home of some friends, bought groceries for the week, and picked up my mail at the office. There were a lot of golden eagles on Eagle Peak. Some evenings I counted as many as 20 roosting in the trees below the lookout, with their wings outstretched in the fading sunlight. Once in a great while, an eagle would perch on the railing of the walkway around the lookout. Otherwise, it was a fairly calm summer. The weather was cool and damp, and I actually only spotted a couple of small smokes all summer.
The first involved the first-year lookout on Eagle Peak. She called me late one night on the radio and was just terrified. Someone was climbing the wooden steps of her tower and when she called out to them, they stopped climbing. She had the trap door locked but she was terrified someone was trying to get her. For some reason she could not contact the boss, but I was able to. He jumped in the pickup and immediately headed up to Eagle Peak with a gun in his lap. In the meantime, I spent the better part of an hour just trying to calm her down.
The summer of 1972 on Eagle Peak staffed by a new female lookout: we had a small platform that we could load the water cans as well as groceries onto, and then winch it up to the cabin. There were some sisal ropes that held the platform level at each of the four corners. On Eagle Peak, there was a herd of wild horses in the area. That night, they had gathered around the bottom of the tower. They were grabbing the rope with their teeth. When they let loose, the little wooden platform would drop to the ground. It sounded just like someone clumping up the stairs in heavy boots. It was too dark to see the horses. She wasn’t about to look over the edge. And when she called out to them, they stopped, of course. Kind of a small event, but that night it seemed like the end of the world for her.”
My husband and I, Gary and Cheryl Anthony , from Spokane, WA. were assigned to Eagle Peak in the summer of 1974. We loved our summer spent there. The end of June 1974 we and our German Hair Pointer, Willy made our way up to the tower. A road grader led the way as there was still 3 to 4 feet of snow towards the top.
What a wonderful adventure! Besides scoping out wildfires, we were treated to thunder and lightening storms, a mama bear swatting her 2 cubs up a tree to let us pass on the road to town., and the wonderful visitors we hosted that summer. It was a wonderful way to begin our married life.
Thank you so much for sharing this with us Cheryl!
1974 Eagle Peak attended to by Gary and Cheryl Anthony of Spokane, Wa