Built in 1914 (rustic architecture). Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1992.
From the record
“The Twin Sisters Lookout, also known as the Twin Sisters Radio Tower and the Twin Sisters Shelter Cabin, was built by the U.S. Forest Service in 1914, the year before the establishment of Rocky Mountain National Park.”
Wikipedia article Twin Sisters Lookout, CC BY-SA 4.0.
One of 110 National Register listings published here for Larimer County · listed in 1992 · category: Building · built in 1914, rustic architecture, by United States Forest Service.
National Register reference number.92001670- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
Fires near this property
168 since 1992
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 168 fires within 5 miles of Twin Sisters Lookout
between 1992 and 2020, burning about 22 acres in total. 23 started naturally. None was recorded as arson.
Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted
here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
Reported cause
Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
104
Recreation and ceremony
28
Natural
23
Equipment and vehicle use
9
Debris and open burning
3
Power generation/transmission/distribution
1
The most recent of
them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service
that recorded it.
Date
Cause
Size
Reported by
Name on the report
7 September 2020
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
under an acre
Estes Valley Fire Protection District
N/A
6 September 2020
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
under an acre
Estes Valley Fire Protection District
N/A
6 September 2010
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
under an acre
Colorado State Forest Service-State Headquarters
not named
5 September 1993
Natural
under an acre
Colorado State Forest Service-Boulder District
not named
26 September 1992
Recreation and ceremony
under an acre
Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee National Grassland
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
2 workings within 5 miles of Twin Sisters Lookout: 1 past producer, 1 producer.
1 still produces. What was taken out: Beryllium, Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Estes Park, the town this property stands in, in 20 storm reports between 1996 and 2023: 11 hail, 6 lightning, 1 flash flood, 1 tornado.
The reports record 2 deaths and 13 injuries. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office
filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date
opens the federal record of that event.
Lightning killed a 35-yr old man and seriously injured his wife and young daughter. The family was hiking near the Gore Range Overlook along Trail Ridge Road when the thunderstorm developed, at an elevation of 11,700 feet.
Six people received minor injuries when lightning struck a nearby scenic overlook atop Trail Ridge Road. The charge apparently travelled across the ground and shocked the group.
Two people were injured when they were struck by lightning at the Forest Canyon Overlook, at nearly 12,000 feet elevation along Trail Ridge Road. The thunderstorm formed rapidly overhead. One of the victims was badly burned, the other had no visible injuries.
Heavy rain caused five very small dams in the Big Elk Meadows area to fail. As a result, a family became trapped when a county road was washed out and floodwaters damaged their home. Road closures included: U.S. 34 east/west, between Loveland and Estes Park; CO14 east/west, between Walden and Ted's Place. Larimer County Roads 27E, 25E, 52E and 54E were all closed near La Porte due to flash flooding. Several roads were also washed out southwest of Loveland and north of Fort Collins.
No historic map-sheet match is published
for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs
a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
Browse the county's mapped places while that work is
pending.
Listed places nearby
6 within 8 miles
Other National Register properties close
enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both
positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties
to their map sheets.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.
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