DeVan Shumway died on 23 April of lung disease. His obituary ran in yesterday’s Washington Post.
Van was the spokesmen for the Committee to Re-Elect the President throughout the 1972 campaign, including the contentious and controversial Watergate period.
Mr. Shumway, a native of Blanding, Utah, attended the University of Utah and served in the Marine Corps during the Korean War. He worked for what became United Press International, rising to the position of West Coast bureau chief in 1959, a job he held for 10 years.
He led the unsuccessful 1970 reelection campaign for Sen. George Murphy (R-Calif.) before going to work for Nixon as assistant director of communications for the White House. In 1972, he switched to the reelection committee, where he was director of public relations.
He left the committee in late 1973 and became editor of newspapers in Springfield, Ill., and San Diego. He returned to Washington in 1975 to direct the public information office for the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
In 1978, he became editor and publisher of Oil Daily, a trade publication, and in 1989 he became owner and publisher of the Utility Spotlight newsletter. He retired in 2000.
He was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Oakton ward and enjoyed golf and travel.