<p>Barton</p>

Shirley L. Barton of Battle Ground, Wash., died Nov. 3, 2011, just short of her 84th birthday.

She was born to Erwin and Hazel Forslund in Denver, Colo., joining brother Gordon.

Following her father’s work on oil pipelines in the Middle East, the family escaped from the Holy Land through U-boat infested waters aboard the Queen Mary. After a safe arrival in the U.S., her father took the family to Portland where he organized a group of pipefitters in the Kaiser ship building yards.

As her life normalized after the war, Shirley contracted polio, but went on to move out of the polio ward to raise a family and fulfill her life’s interest in art.

In 1961 she met Austin Barton, a native of Wallowa County, in art school; they married and combined two families into a cluster of 10.

Over the next 23 years they would create thousands of illustrations for the fashion and merchandise industry. At the age of 57, they found their life’s purpose, bronze sculpting. Eventually over 1,400 bronzes would dot the globe in a dozen countries, with 27 live-sized monuments on public display.

She is survived by Austin A. Barton, her husband of 49 years; sons (and their wives), Al and Coleen Barton, Tim and Mary Anne Ryerse and Jim Barton; daughters (and their husbands), Debby and Bob Groth, Janet and Rick Clements, Teresa Ryerse (and fiancé Tony), Louella and Jack Bennett and Gayle Ryerse; 11 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held at Gateway Little Chapel of the Chimes in Portland 2 -5 p.m. Nov. 19, 2011. For more information, or to sign her virtual guest book, go to: www.gatewaylittlechapel.com.