PISTOL BUTTE
Deschutes County - Deschutes National Forest - 20S-15E-33
June 7, 1932: "In early June, R.C. Burgess, Ranger, is working on a four and a half mile telephone line to the summit of Pistol Butte and if the weather conditions continue the brush removed from the site will be burned." (The Bend Bulletin)
August 13, 1932: "A 30 foot tower for the lookout house approved for Pistol Butte, in the La Pine district, will be started in about a week. It will be necessary to haul material to the top of Pistol Butte with horses or a tractor."
(The Bend Bulletin)
1933: A 20-foot round timber tower with a 14x14 L-4 hip-roof lookout cab was completed at a cost of $1,172.94.
June 19, 1933: "Mr. and Mrs. Frederick H. Vogel were married last Saturday night and will spend the summer on Pistol Butte, where Vogel is to be stationed as a forest service lookout." (The Bend Bulletin)
August 5, 1933: "Using his fire finder, Fred Vogel, lookout on Pistol Butte, took a “shot” at the full moon last night and confirmed the statement of astronomers that the earth’s attendant orb has a diameter well in excess of 2000 miles. Vogel didn’t doubt the data of astronomers, for he is a former Carnegie Tech student, but he had a desire to try out his fire finder on some distant object that is really distant. The moon last night happened to be about 238,840 miles away. Despite this great distance, Vogel came within 65 miles of calculating the exact diameter of the moon, 2,162 miles, with his fire finder.
In taking his reading of the moon, Vogel used the same system lookouts use in estimating the diameter of a fire blazing in the midstate woods, the tangent offset being calculated from the angular difference of readings.
Although he closely calculated the diameter of the moon, Vogel did not submit any figures as to the time it would take a Deschutes fireman to reach the satellite providing a fire were found burning near one of the craters.
(The Bend Bulletin)
1954: Lookout training was conducted this year at the tower.
Removed