Michael E. “Mike” Nielson (McCall ’73)
Posted: September 20, 2025
Mike died September 20, 2025, in Gold Beach, Oregon. He was born December 12, 1946, in Miami, Florida. He graduated from Thomas Jefferson H.S. in Council Bluff, Iowa. In 1964 where he lettered in Football, Baseball and Track. He medaled at the Drake Relays in the Sprint Medley Relay and was offered an athletic scholarship at Omaha University. Mike went on to the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he played football and crew and graduated with a degree in Cultural Anthropology. He received another degree from the University of Montana in Political Science in 1974 and did post graduate work at the University of Washington. Mike got his pilot’s license in 1971.
Mike served in the Marine Corps 1966-68, with a tour in Vietnam where he received two Purple Hearts. His work with the USFS started in in 1971 with the Los Padres Hotshots, Packer/Muleskinner Los Padres 1972, Smokejumper McCall 1973-75, and Smokejumper Redding 1976-78. After four years at the Boise Interagency Fire Center as Aircraft Coordinator, he went to a Customs Broker (Seattle) 1985-86, Burlington Northern Worldwide 1978-88, Northern Express Transportation Authority, Shelby, MT, ’89 – ’91.
As Executive Director he conducted a federal DOT feasibility study on the
formation of an inland port as an implementation device to the US/Canada Free Trade Agreement, wrote the Memorandum of Understanding between the State of Montana and the Province of Alberta on over-weight commercial trucks, and testified to Congress on Crow’s Nest subsidies by the Canadian Pacific Railroad Consultant.
Pictured National Geographic, 10/72, Baja Issue, captioned as “…one of a hardy band who delight in their own discomfort, he threaded the Baja peninsula in an open jeep.”
Cast in the role of the train conductor in A River Runs Through It, a film directed and co-produced by Robert Redford, Bozeman, MT, 1991.
