Mount Lemmon

Mount Lemmon is in the Santa Catalina Mountains located in the Coronado National Forest north of Tucson, AZ. It is 9,157 feet above sea-level. Mount Lemmon was named in honor of Sarah Lemmon, wife of botanist John Gill Lemmon, who trekked to the top of the mountain with her husband in 1881.

A small town called Summerhaven is on the mountain, which includes many cabins only occupied part of the year. Much of this town was devestated by the Aspen Fire of 2003, and recovery is still taking place.

It is the site of an observatory [1], which was formerly the site of a radar base of the Air Defense Command, and the building that formerly housed a military emergency radar tracking station for landing the Space Shuttle at White Sands, NM. Although the United States Military had a presence on the mountain for several decades all their facilities have been abandoned. The telescopes on the mountain are still used for astronomical research today by organizations such as the Catalina Sky Survey, although the largest user are participants in the University of Arizona Astronomy Camp program.

The location 'Windy Point' was built by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, using a large number of prisoners over a period of 18 years.

There is also an isolated population of American red squirrels on the mountain.

External links

Mt. Lemmon website
Computer generated summit panoramas North South index

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