Winchester Mountain Lookout

Built in 1935. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

From the record

“The historical Winchester Lookout, located in the North Cascades in the U.S. state of Washington, provides views of the Northern Picket Range, Mount Baker, Mount Shuksan, Mount Larrabee, and Canadian peaks. The steep snowfields usually require an ice-axe well into July.”
Wikipedia article Winchester Mountain Lookout, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 74 National Register listings published here for Whatcom County · listed in 1987 · category: Structure · built in 1935.

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 1 structure as contributing to the listing.
Address. Mt. Baker Wilderness Area overlooking the N fork of Nooksack River and W fork of Silesia Creek, Sedro Wooley
When was it listed? July 1987
Category. structure
Also known as. USDA Forest Service Fire Lookouts on Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest TR
Census division. East Whatcom
When was it built? 1935
National Register reference number. 87001188 - 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

15 since 1997

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 15 fires within 5 miles of Winchester Mountain Lookout between 1997 and 2015, burning about 2 acres in total. 7 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
Recreation and ceremony	7
Natural	7
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	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 1997	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	YOUR WELCOME
23 September 2012	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	HEADWATERS
1 September 2008	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	WELCOME PASS
6 August 2009	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	CROSS COUNTRY
2 August 2007	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Washington State Department of Natural Resources Headquarters	not named
6 July 2015	Natural	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	SEFRIT
4 July 2015	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	RIVER BANK
4 July 2015	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest	RAZOR HOME

Every fire recorded in Whatcom County

Mines and quarries near this property

10 of 48 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 48 workings within 5 miles of Winchester Mountain Lookout: 19 occurrences, 18 past producers, 8 prospects, 2 unknowns. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Gold, Copper, Gold, Silver, Lead. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Boundary Red Mountain	Gold, Silver, Copper, Tellurium, Bismuth	Occurrence
Boundary Red Mountain Mine	Gold, Silver, Copper, Tellurium, Bismuth	Past Producer	1898, 1912, 1946
Boundry Red Mountain Mine	Gold, Bismuth, Copper, Silver, Tellurium	Past Producer
Evergreen	Zinc, Silver, Lead, Gold, Copper	Occurrence
Evergreen Mine	Gold, Copper, Zinc, Lead, Silver	Past Producer	1904, 1939
Gargett	Gold, Silver, Copper, Lead, Zinc	Occurrence
Gargett Mine	Gold, Silver, Zinc, Lead, Copper	Past Producer	1901
Gold Run Mine	Gold, Copper, Silver	Past Producer	Contact Metasomatic
J.E. Sigh Mine	Gold, Copper	Occurrence	Gold
Lone Jack	Gold, Silver, Copper, Bismuth	Occurrence

Every working recorded in Whatcom 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

2 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
	International Boundary US-Canada	6.2 miles	1989
	Austin Pass Warming Hut	7.3 miles	1990

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 87001188 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Whatcom County	All 74 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.