Archives West Finding Aid

Public administrator, trade association executive.

Gus Norwood was born in 1916. He was raised on a small, unelectrified farm, which he helped electrify in 1934. He was appointed to the U.S. Naval Academy in 1935. After graduation in 1939, he served on combat ships during World War II, chiefly in engineering capacities. He resigned in 1946 to attend Harvard University where he received the masters degree in Public Administration. For 20 years he served as the first Executive Secretary of the Northwest Public Power Association at Vancouver, Washington. A prolific writer and speaker, Norwood often testified for the construction of Pacific Northwest dams and power lines. In 1967 Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall appointed Norwood as the first Administrator of the Alaska power Administration at Juneau, Alaska. In 1972 he served briefly with the Atomic Energy Commission in Maryland. In 1974 BPA Administrator Don Hodel invited Norwood to join the BPA staff and, among other duties, write a history of BPA policies.