Bluff Mountain Tower Site
WillhiteWeb.com
Status: Former Lookout
Elevation: 3,372 feet
prom 1,252 feet
State: Virginia
County: Rockbridge and Amherst
AT Access: trail over the top
If you have more information about this site, please contact me.
Ottie Cline Powell Memorial
Also at this summit is the spot where Ottie Cline Powell died. He was just 4 years old and had wondered off the wrong way from his school. He had traveled several miles so he was not located until 5 months later beside a tree at this summit. It is believed he died from a storm the first night he was out.
Around 1917, the U.S. Forest Service built a fire lookout tower on Bluff Mountain.
In 1932, it was announced in a newspaper that a new lookout tower would be constructed on Bluff Mountain saying the Bluff mountain structure would be a forty-foot steel tower with a 14 x 14 foot cabin on top for living quarters and an observatory.
Only the footings remain today.
Ottie Cline memorial
Route of the AT over Bluff Mountain
1965 USGS, 1971 updated
1950 USGS, 1958 updated
Bluff Mountain Lookout Footings
Bluff Mountain Lookout Tower July 1969
Tower sign
My Visit
As fate would have it, as I arrived at the summit and memorial, I had not seen anyone all day and it was quite lonely, wet, cold and stormy out. Before coming, I knew the story of Ottie and somehow I felt a connection to his awful situation as I stared at his death site.
Appalachian Trail and lookout footing
Bluff Mountain Summit
Footing
Footing with white blaze
Ottie Cline Powell