JACKSON COUNTY
RUSTLER PEAK
Rogue River National Forest
34S-4E-16
34S-4E-16
May 13, 1913: "District No. 2, (Mosquito) -- Except for the slopes of Rustler Peak and the headwaters of Rancheria Creek, the district is pretty well supplied with roads, trails, and telephone lines. A lookout is stationed on Rustler and another lookout stationed on Robinson Butte can see over a large part of the district. These 2 lookoutmen can report most fires, but for the especially hazardous areas on Rancheria Creek and at the base of Rustler Peak there should constantly be two men on patrol. It is proposed to station in this district, one man in Township 34 - 2 East, one man on Rancheria Creek and one man at Snow Shoe and another man at Willow Prairie, it funds permit. There is a little plantation of about 100 acres of yellow pine adjacent to Snow Shoe. The fire risk adjacent to and in it is great. Tall grass and brush occur on all sides. A man should be stationed here if for no other purpose than to protect this little plantation." (District Fire, Fire Plan -- History of the Rogue River National Forest, Volume 1 - 1893-1932 -- Carroll E. Brown)
May 10, 1915: "Bert Mason of Prospect passed through here Friday on his way to Lodge Pole with a water tank. The Ressler Peak lookout station will be greatly benefited by it." (Medford Mail Tribune)
September 4, 1915: "Lester Smith who has been spending his vacation with his cousin, Ray Parker, stationed by forest service on Ressler Peak, returned home the latter part of last week." (Mail Tribune)
September 12, 1915: "Ray Parker, lookout-man on Rustler Peak, discontinued his work there yesterday afternoon and went over to Devils Peak to visit his cousin, Assistant Ranger Smith, who is lookout-man there. Mr. Parker will return to town Friday or Saturday and will begin a term of high school in the Higinbotham district next Monday.
Merle Brainard, brother-in-law to Ray Parker, took Rays place as lookout-man on Mt. Rustler. Mr. Brainard has been stationed on Oak Mountain, but we understand that this station is discontinued for the rest of the season." (Medford Sun)
July 26, 1916: "W. Ray Parker went to his station, Russell's Peak, Tuesday, where he is lookout during the summer." (Mail Tribune)
July 28, 1916: "E.H. Watson and Wm. Hughes are also employed by the Government in the forest service, the former being stationed near the Goss homestead and the latter having the Lodgepole station. Ray Parker is on Mt. Rustler, as last year." (Medford Sun)
September 12, 1916: "Ray Parker was down from his station at Rustler's Peak and spent Sunday with home folks." (Mail Tribune)
May 7, 1917: "An allotment has just been received by the forest service for the purpose of constructing three lookout houses, one each on Windy Peak, Rustler Peak and Mt. McLoughlin, or Mt. Pitt as it is erroneously named by many.
The house at Rustler Peak will be erected on the top of an 18-foot steel tower. All these lookout stations except Mt. McLoughlin has telephone lines extending to them." (Ashland Tidings)
June 30, 1917: "District Forester George H. Cecil, of Portland, has just placed an order with the Mill-Maid Construction Company, of Portland, for ready-cut material for three standard lookout houses. One of which will be erected on the summit of Rustler Peak, on the Crater National Forest, in July.
This house is twelve feet square, with a cupola six feet square. Both the cupola and the main part of the building have windows running all the way around. The lower part of the house is the lookout man's living quarters, while the cupola contains the Osborne fire finder, maps and other equipment." (Medford Sun)
July 13, 1917: "The Forest Service is rushing the three fire-lookouts on Windy Peak, Mt. McLaughlin and Rustler Butte, so that there will be no delay in preparation for fire fighting. The fire-lookout houses, knocked down, have been shipped from Portland. Ten Government mules will be needed to transport the houses to the peaks." (Medford Sun)
July 15, 1917: "Lee Wright and wife left Monday for Rustlers Peak, where Mr. Wright is stationed by the Forest Service for the season." (Medford Sun)
October 2, 1917: "The federal forest service completed Windy Peak lookout station yesterday, the Mt. Pitt station will be completed today and Rustler Peak station will be completed Thursday. This work will increase the already high efficiency of the federal fire fighting service in southern Oregon. All the lumber for the lookout stations was shipped in ready to be put in place and to get to the tops of the lookout stations special trails had to be built and the lumber taken up by pack train." (Medford Mail Tribune)
1917: "Ranger Jones of Butte Falls District reports a water tank had been built on Rustler Peak in 1915. When examined in 1917 by Jones and Hughes it was full of good clear water even though there was three inches of solid ice on top."
"A tower was built on Rustler Peak during the summer. Material was hauled by mules to the site." (History of the Rogue River National Forest, Volume 1 - 1893-1932 - Carroll E. Brown)
August 10, 1919: "Rustler peak lookout tower, one of several hundred fine lookout stations maintained by the forest service in the mountains of Oregon and Washington, is situated on the top of Rustler peak at am elevation of 6200 feet on the Crater national forest in southern Oregon. An extended view of the Cascade range, Siskiyou mountains and the Coast range and intervening valleys is obtained from this point. The man employed as lookout is an old settler in the region and knows every ridge and canyon of the surrounding country.
With the aid of a fire-finder--an instrument built like a surveying instrument, which gives the exact direction of distant objects--and accurate maps, there is no chance of his missing the exact location of any blaze that may spring up. As soon as a fire is discovered, its location is immediately telephoned to the district ranger, who dispatches a party of men to put it out.
Fresh water is supplied for the man who lives in the tower by a novel means. Snow does not melt entirely off the north side of the peak until about the middle of July. A galvanized iron tank which will hold 300 gallons is installed about 50 feet below the top of the peak. Snow from the nearby snow banks is shoveled into the tank and the natural heat of the atmosphere melts it. When the last snowbank is about to disappear care is taken to see that the tank is full. The 300 gallons of water in the tank lasts the lookout throughout the dry season until the rains come in the fall.
The tower is used during three or four months of the summer and fall when there is danger of forest fires. The man who occupies it has the opportunity of enjoying many beautiful sunrises and sunsets over the surrounding mountain peaks. If he looks out of his windows on a moonlight night or just at dawn he is likely to see several deer playing about the top of the peak. Sometimes he wakes up in the morning and sees clouds stretched out below him for miles and miles in every direction, while the tower itself is bathed in the sunlight which is just streaming over one of the higher peaks.
There is lots to interest him and as he is connected by telephone with the outside world, the job is not so lonely as one might think." (The Sunday Oregonian)
October 10, 1924: "C.C. Beall of Butte Falls was a local caller today. Mr. Beall has been stationed at the lookout station at Rustler Peak during the summer." (Medford Mail Tribune)
July 25, 1933: Panorama photos taken by Lester Moe and James Rittenhouse.
May 14, 1934: "Two men from the South Fork of the Rogue CCC camp were placed on duty at Rustler Peak yesterday." (Medford Mail Tribune)
June 7, 1934: "Mrs. Blossom Smith went to Rustler lookout station to live during the summer." (Medford Mail Tribune)
1938: A five man crew from the South Fork CCC camp expended $50.00 on a lookout house betterment project.
1939: Another lookout betterment project was conducted using five men from the South Fork camp. This project expended $70.00.
May 29, 1940: "Because of the lightning danger, a lookout was posted today at Rustler Peak in the Butte Falls district of the Rogue forest." (Medford Mail Tribune)
1940: A ten man crew from the South Fork CCC camp expended $600.00 on lookout construction.
1940: "Rustler Peak lookout, Carol Robe, reported that on the afternoon of June 22, a meteor, about the size of a football and 'making very good time,' went over his location and landed in the canyon between Rustler and Parker Meadows." (The History of the Rogue River National Forest, Vol. 2)
1941: In the early summer a ten man crew from the South Fork camp was assigned to the lookout construction project on Rustler Peak, with another $500.00 in expenses. (History of the Rogue River National Forest, Vol. 2 - by Carroll E. Brown)
1948: A laminated timber tower, 31'6" tall, with an L-4 cab was completed. The laminated timber tower made up of three 2x10 boards for each leg.
September 9, 1960: "Manning the Rustler Peak lookout are Mr. and Mrs. Howard Greer, who report that they have had lots of cold, wet weather with some snow. The Greers have manned the Rustler Peak stations for three years.
Rustler Peak, being the key lookout for Butte Falls district, receives and sends out coded weather reports, receives check calls from handi-talkie radios and mobile units throughout the forest. Their main job, of course, is looking for fires." (Medford Mail Tribune)
2006: Contractors installed a new modern vault toilet system at the lookout site.
