‘It was annihilated.’ Inside the vandalism of the High Rock Lookout
Rick McClure, board member of Sand Mountain Society, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving historical structures in natural places, doesn’t “do social media.” It took a call from one of his members alerting him to an Instagram video posted last Thursday to learn that his beloved High Rock Lookout had been vandalized.
Somebody, or some people, had smashed its windows, broken the door and tossed valuable items off a cliff. Years of painstaking restoration work by Sand Mountain Society had been undone.
“We really credit the individual on social media for alerting us and helping us get moving out there,” McClure told The News Tribune over the phone on Wednesday.
The High Rock Lookout, built by the U.S. Forest Service in 1931 for emergency fire detection, has sustained the elements now for 95 years, but not on its own.
McClure’s first visit to High Rock Lookout was in 1983. Then, in 1997, he went up again while working for the Forest Service and helped get it listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Since then, it has become one of the most popular hikes in the South Cascades.
High Rock Lookout sits at 5,685 feet elevation and a short 1.6-mile hike up takes you to the top. There you’ll find unobstructed 360 degree views of the Nisqually River Valley and a straight shot at Mount Rainier.
High Rock Lookout kept a volunteer staffer until 2004 when its resident was unable to continue. After that, it fell into disrepair.
“There were a couple of volunteer groups that would help paint it every once in a while,” McClure said. “But it was really suffering from weather abuse.”
Nearby White Pass Country Historical Museum began organizing groups interested in restoring the lookout in 2015.
Then, in 2019, McClure and the Sand Mountain Society took over the project. McClure says COVID shut down their efforts for a little while, but they’d managed to begin feeling like they were getting close to completion.
Until now.
The destruction of High Rock Lookout
On Friday morning, Sara Osburn, a volunteer with High Rock Lookout Restoration Project, an offshoot of Sand Mountain Society, received a text asking if she and some other volunteers could hike up and assess the damage.
“It was annihilated,” she told The News Tribune. “It wasn’t just vandalism. With vandalism, you think broken window, maybe spray paint, carving someone’s name. This was total annihilation of the work done up there.”
The first thing Osburn noticed when she arrived at the lookout on Friday morning was the door.
“They had to work really hard to get into the lookout,” she said. “Like ripping the door off the jams, there was a special kind of screw in there that you can’t remove unless you have a special tool. And they had ripped the entire door off. It’s gone.”
Vandals had also broken over 60% of the windows.
“The amount of work that was put into restoring those windows was huge. They were all gone before, and now they’re gone again,” Osburn said.
The Forest Service sent Cowlitz Valley District law enforcement officer Miles Stipek, who covers Gifford Pinchot National Forest, including High Rock Lookout. He hiked the 1.6 miles up to the lookout to assess the damage.
There, Stipek took photographs and helped secure the lookout as best as he could.
“We’re doing our best to close this case and figure out who did this,” Stipek said on a Facebook video filmed by a High Rock Lookout Restoration Project volunteer. “Any info the public has, we’re encouraging the public to speak up.”
Stipek urged the public to respect the closure.
High Rock Lookout is on Gifford Pinchot National Forest land, which makes the crime a federal offense.
A witness comes forward
Sand Mountain Society is helping secure High Rock Lookout by heading up this weekend to clean up, take stock, and keep watch.
“We’re going to start maintaining permanent occupancy as much as we have people available,” McClure said. “So that we can make sure no more vandalism happens. Occupancy a key to keeping these things alive.”
Fire lookouts and other structures on public lands have an unfortunate history of seemingly random acts of violence. High Rock Lookout has been vandalized before, though not to this level.
In May, Methow Valley Fire Lookout Association reported that another fire lookout, Lookout Mountain, had its shutter cable cut and front door damaged.
McClure says the only time he’s ever seen anything to this level was in Mount Hood National Forest. A 1933 compound with 12 buildings was destroyed by copper thieves in 2006. The thieves broke into all the buildings, ripped out the copper wiring, and smashed out all the windows and doors.
Two days after the vandalism at High Rock Lookout had been widely reported on social media, a break in the case came: A witness stepped forward.
“We had somebody message who said, ‘Oh by the way, I was a witness to this,’” McClure told The News Tribune. “They said they were up there Tuesday evening between 6 and 8pm, and four people were there vandalizing it. And he had vehicle descriptions. We put him in touch with [Forest Service officer] Miles Stipek, who has been incredibly supportive and helpful. He’s doing what he does, and hopefully we will track these people down.”
The News Tribune reached out to the U.S. Forest Service for comment and was told that the investigation is active, with no further information provided.
Strong at the broken places
As horrible as this whole thing has been for The High Rock Lookout Restoration Project, Osburn keeps reminding people of the outpouring of love and support from the outdoor community.
“It has been totally amazing how many people have reached out and donated their money and time and memories,” Osburn said.
“We’re definitely going to build back stronger.”
Osburn says the best way for people to help is to donate. “What we need the most, if I’m honest, is money.”
At the time of writing, the High Rock Restoration Project is $12,000 short of its $20,000 goal. Donations can be made on the White Pass Country Historical Society website.
McClure is unsure how long the restoration project will now take but insists the vandalism won’t slow them down for long.
As for the vandals, McClure can’t quite wrap his head around it. In the case of the copper wiring theft at Mount Hood, there was a motive.
“I would love to know what the motive was here,” he said.
Anyone with information related to the crime is encouraged to contact the Cowlitz Valley Ranger Station at 360-497-1100.
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