Free at Last

Story and Photos by John M. Larsen

Just across the Marsing Bridge in Owyhee County, several lots that once held the Marsing Youth Center, the Maverick Café, and other buildings are now occupied by an auto parts store. I’m sure this change made the ghost of Buddy Shields dance.

Alfred (Bud) Shields, a 1953 graduate of Marsing High School, was a hometown boy who made good as a real estate developer. He put together the Hidden Hollow subdivision and owned much of the ground to the north of the city.

This included the Rufus Uranga farm, which embraced most of the land from the west side of C Canal to Bruneau Highway. He later bought about thirty acres of riverfront from Les Loucks, which extended Buddy’s holdings from the C Canal to the Snake River.

On the city map, these properties are listed as lots one to twelve of the Butte Platt, so named because the Marsing brothers, who originally owned and subdivided the land, intended to call the city Butte after the landmark Lizard Butte right across the river.

To their chagrin, the U.S. Post Office would not let them use the name, because there already was a town named Butte, near Arco.