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Warren C. Shaw ( Missoula 1943 )

posted: Mar 2, 2010

Warren died February 27, 2010, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. He was born December 15, 1921, on a family farm in Western Oklahoma and graduated from Hinton H.S. in 1940.

He entered the CCC and learned surveying while working on several project with the Army Corps of Engineers on proposed dam sites in Arkansas and Oklahoma. As a member of the Brethren Church, he was drafted into the Civilian Public Service in 1942 and continued his work as a surveyor with the Soil Conservation Service.

In the spring of 1943 Warren was among the first CPS people to be accepted to the smokejumper program and reported to Seeley Lake, MT. "I had never seen the mountains before, and I recall thinking that Missoula was the prettiest city that I had ever seen. When we arrived at Seeley Lake, it was beyond anything in my wildest dreams. Even the rich people in Oklahoma didn't have anything like this."

Warren was stationed at Moose Creek R.S. "I jumped three or four fires that season. After the last one we were snowed bound at a deserted cabin with tree elk hunters whose plane could not get in to pick them and their elk up. Anyone who has not eaten elk stew for breakfast, lunch and dinner for three days can't imagine what they are missing."

After his discharge in 1946, he returned to Oklahoma and worked the annual wheat harvest in the mid-west to Canada. In 1949 Warren returned to surveying with one of the largest firms in Oklahoma. One of his big jobs was as engineer/architect on the Will Rogers Airport in Oklahoma City.

In 1966 he moved to the Oklahoma Highway Dept. where he was highly regarded as one of the top land surveyors in the state. Warren retired in 1985.