Bluewater Lookout Complex

Built in 1917. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.

From the record

“The Bluewater Lookout Complex, in Otero County, New Mexico near Weed, New Mexico was established in 1937. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.”
Wikipedia article Bluewater Lookout Complex, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 24 National Register listings published here for Otero County · listed in 1988 · category: Structure · built in 1917.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 2 buildingss, 1 structure as contributing to the listing.
Address. Lincoln National Forest, Weed, 88354
When was it listed? January 1988
Category. structure
Also known as. National Forest Fire Lookouts in the Southwestern Region TR
Census division. Southeast Otero
When was it built? 1917
National Register reference number. 87002486 - 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

50 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 50 fires within 5 miles of Bluewater Lookout Complex between 1992 and 2019, burning about 1,300 acres in total. 31 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
Natural	31
Equipment and vehicle use	8
Recreation and ceremony	3
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	3
Debris and open burning	3
Power generation/transmission/distribution	2

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
21 September 2011	Natural	12 acres	Lincoln National Forest	BLUE WATER
7 August 2019	Natural	1.5 acres	Capitan District	20-50340160X
6 August 2011	Natural	20 acres	Lincoln National Forest	RAIL
5 August 2011	Natural	under an acre	Lincoln National Forest	EHART
3 August 2012	Natural	under an acre	Lincoln National Forest	BELL II
3 August 2011	Natural	under an acre	New Mexico State Forestry Division	WEED
25 August 2005	Natural	under an acre	Lincoln National Forest	WITHOUT
23 August 2010	Natural	under an acre	Lincoln National Forest	AKER

Every fire recorded in Otero County

Mines and quarries near this property

2 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 2 workings within 5 miles of Bluewater Lookout Complex: 1 producer, 1 unknown. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken, Stone. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where	Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
	Pinon Site Pit	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
	State Hwy Pit No. 63-8-S	Stone	Unknown

Every working recorded in Otero County

Storms near this property

5 since 2000

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Weed, the town this property stands in, in 5 storm reports between 2000 and 2015: 4 hail, 1 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. 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.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
May 2015	Hail	Weed	-	The person that reported golf ball size hail in Weed said it appeared to be more extensive toward the town of Sacramento.
August 2007	Hail	Weed	-	A stationary thunderstorm dropped heavy rain and quarter size hail on the town of Weed.
June 2000	Flash Flood	Weed	-	Heavy rain resulted in a 4 foot wall of water descending down a canyon within a burn area.
June 2007	Hail	Weed	-	no account filed
July 2005	Hail	Weed	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Otero County

Map coverage status

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

1 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.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	Weed Lookout Tower	7.1 miles	1988

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 87002486 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Otero County	All 24 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

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.