Hugh A. Shamberger was born in Idaho in 1900. He attended schools in the Payette region and graduated from Stanford University with an engineering degree. He worked at surveying and engineering jobs in California, and when Hoover Dam was in the planning stages, he decided to make a home in Nevada. Arriving in Las Vegas early in 1929, Shamberger began a new phase of his career, working at mining and engineering in the developing community.

One of Shamberger's new friends in Las Vegas was Alfred Merritt Smith, who became the state engineer of Nevada. Under Smith's sponsorship, Shamberger also entered the state service, first in the State Highway Department, and then in the office of the state engineer. While in this office Shamberger pioneered several techniques of studying the water resources of his adopted state, and wrote of his researches in several monographs that are widely used. As state engineer, he was instrumental in aiding Nevada's cause in the Colorado River litigation, Arizona v. California, in the 1950s.

As the duties of the state engineer's office became more complex, Shamberger designed and pressed to completion a reordering of several state offices concerned with state resources, and the Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources was created. This office contained the office of the state engineer, the Division of Water Resources, the Division of Forestry, the Division of Oil and Gas, and the Division of State Land. Hugh Shamberger became the first director of the new office.

He was the head of the state's Civilian Defense organization during World War II, and he served two terms as a county commissioner of Ormsby County (Carson City). During his term as county commissioner, Shamberger organized, and became the first president of, the State Association of County Commissioners.

After his retirement, Shamberger became director of the Center for Water Resources Research, a division of the Desert Research Institute at the University of Nevada. Under his leadership, it has become nationally known and respected for pioneering studies of water problems.

The memoir includes reminiscences of early days in Idaho and California, an account of Shamberger's work in the Las Vegas Valley in the early 1930s, a discussion of water and land problems in Nevada, impressions of the Colorado River adjudication, information about the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, and discussions of political and civic affairs.