Fire Towers: Form over Function?

About two months ago, I read about the Department of Environmental Conservation’s Adirondack Fire Tower Study and the “Hurricane Mountain Primitive Area – Draft Unit Management Plan.” I talked to some people about their opinions about it, since it created a bit of discord among North Country citizens, and I heard opinions ranging from calling the Hurricane fire tower “a hunk of junk,” to beliefs that the towers should be restored for their historic value.

I hadn‘t heard anything about the proposed removal of the towers on Hurricane and St. Regis

Hurricane Mountain fire tower / photo by Mwanner

mountains lately, so I decided to look into it. I didn’t find out what course of action would be taken, but the Adirondack Park Agency is looking for ways to save the towers.

I also found that that the fire towers of the Adirondacks have a lot of history behind them. Although no longer in use, they have a rich background, and there’s no way I could cover it all. I’ll give you a crash course.

The story of fire towers in the Adirondacks starts in the early 1900’s, when fires plagued the park. Two years in particular, 1903 and 1908, seemed to be especially troublesome, with fires devastating nearly 1 million acres of land, according to the Adirondack Architectural Heritage. To give you an idea of how widespread the fires were, the park is 6.1 million acres, so that means roughly a sixth of the park was affected by fires.

According to the DEC’s website, the Forest, Fish and Game Commission reported about 605 fires in 1908. These fires burned through more than 396,000 acres of forest. Logging and dry, windy weather are considered to be factors in why these fires were so severe.

The fires led to a much more concentrated effort on forest fire prevention and education, and one of the main courses of action was the construction of fire towers on the summits of mountains. The first fire tower in the Adirondacks was built on Mount Morris  in 1909, constructed with logs. Soon, however, towers were constructed of steel instead.

Observers manned the towers, keeping an eye out and alerting park rangers when they spotted fires. Many accounts I’ve heard about these observers say that they weren’t just people sitting up there, watching. They were storytellers who took charge of informing, educating and entertaining the many people who hiked to these towers to climb them and enjoy the panoramic views.

Eventually, more efficient methods of surveying the park for fires were brought into use, including aerial surveillance, and it became more expensive to keep the towers maintained and running during the fire season. The last operating fire towers were closed in 1990.

There were once about 120 fire towers in New York state, with the Adirondack Park giving a home to 57 of them. Only 20 remain standing on state land, while 4 are on private property.

St. Regis Mountain fire tower / photo by Mwanner

Now, some fire towers, such as the ones on Bald (Rondaxe) Mountain, and Poke-O-Moonshine,  have been restored and serve a higher purpose– the education of environmentalists, hikers and wildlife enthusiasts. Groups such as the Friends of Hurricane Mountain or the Friends of St. Regis Mountain are following the model set by other groups, like the Friends of Poke-O-Moonshine, who organized to renovate the fire tower on that summit. In the summer, summit stewards still man the tower to educate people about the natural environment and history of  the Adirondacks.

It seems to me that the towers have a place in Adirondack history and a place in the park. I understand that they no longer serve their original purpose, and  they need to be restored if they’re to do any good, but I can also see that they’re going to cost money. I guess when it comes down to it, I just like them ’cause they look cool.