|
Long
before the Texas Forest Service started using airplanes to spot forest
fires, men climbed to the highest pine tree they could find, preferably
one sitting atop a hill.
Fire spotting trees were seldom effective, especially when winds swayed
the pines, causing some spotters to become sick.
So the Forest Service began building metal lookout towers at strategic
locations in the forests. Fire spotters then had to climb long stairways
before they reached cabs at the top of each towers. |
Fire Lookout
Tower
TE photo, 2009 |
The towers were
more effective, but teenagers on a lark were prone to climb the towers,
too. Some threw items on cars traveling on nearby roads.
Next, the Forest Service turned to an even better way to spot fires--by
airplanes which could fly higher, go anywhere the pilot pleased, and
had mobile connections with ground forces who could move faster to
fire sites.
Today, the planes are still flying--and some of the old lookout towers
are still standing, but are rarely used. Mostly, they’re relics of
another era and one has become a part of the Texas Forest Museum at
Lufkin, surrounded
by a logging train and other memorabilia from sawmills and logging
camps.
The 100-foot tower at Lufkin
has also been altered to prevent access by would-be climbers, but
a lookout cab once used on another tower is displayed inside the Museum’s
main building.
Towers such as the one at Lufkin
were constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1936 and used
from the thirties until they were phased out in the l970s.
The Lufkin tower, which
was moved from its site near Conroe
in 1976, is part of an array of early equipment used by the forest
products industry, including a 1908 locomotive and tender, a 1902
caboose made by the Angelina
& Neches River Railroad, a steam log-loader which could pivot
on its railroad car, a 1946 log truck, a 1950s road grader, a railroad
depot from Camden
in Polk County, and
a derrick car used by a railroad to handle bridge timbers. |
 |
|
|
HOME
