James Spurr L. Spurr

Jim Spurr, Poet Laureate of Shawnee, passed away at his home on Sunday, August 31, 2014. Born in Crystal City, Texas, he moved to Shawnee as a child. Jim Spurr was a graduate of Shawnee High School and Oklahoma Baptist University and also a retired insurance adjustor who operated his own claim service for over 45 years. Spurr was an avid football fan, especially of the Shawnee Wolves and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.

Spurr was a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne and an honorably discharged veteran who once said, “Every poem I have ever written ever since has been a failed effort to capture that brief but glorious instant.” He was the founder of and co-host for the monthly Shawnee poetry readings since 1993 and is a nationally recognized poet. Spurr’s books Open Mike/Thursday Night and Hail Mary On Two were finalists in the Oklahoma Book Awards in 2008 and 2010, while his book It’s Cool at 2A.M. won second place at Palettes and Quills contest in Ithaca, N.Y. His third book, Live Long, Live Loud, is currently in the process of being published. He was a frequent reader at East Central University’s Scissortail Writing Festival in Ada, the Red Dirt Writing Festival in Shawnee, and the Woody Guthrie Folk Festival in Okemah.

He was preceeded in death by his mother Gladys Spurr, his father John W. Bruington, and his step-father Rex Spurr. He is survived by his wife Aline Smith, brothers Harold and Elmer Spurr, sister-in-law Shireen Spurr, nephews Richard and Daniel Spurr; sisters, Bobbie Smedsrud and Delsea Hassell, brothers John and Tom Bruington, in-laws Al and Bernice Smith, Virginia and Don Dyer, Ted and Rhonda Smith, as well as, niece Melanie and her husband and son Karl and Eli Hicks of Tallahassee, Florida; nephew Jason and Jessica Dyer and children Izzy and Vin, nephew Paul Smith and his wife and son Jill and Grady of Shawnee, and son Tanner Smith of Coppell; nephew Kenneth and his wife and child Allison and Sidney Smith of Dallas; and nephew Tommy Smith of Shawnee, special friend Lynda Thompson of San Antonio and numerous cousins