Blood, Trauma, and Biohazard Cleanup in Shawnee, OK

Shawnee is the county seat of Pottawatomie County in central Oklahoma, with a population of 31,377 at the 2020 census, and it is the principal city of the Shawnee Micropolitan Statistical Area.

Shawnee lies along the North Canadian River and Interstate 40, roughly 40 miles east of Oklahoma City.

The Shawnee townsite grew out of the land run of September 22, 1891, which opened the surrounding Sac and Fox, Citizen Potawatomi, and Absentee Shawnee lands to non-Indian settlement; the town was founded in 1893 and incorporated in 1894.

The town was named for the Shawnee people, and a Quaker mission built in 1885 served the Shawnee in the area before the town existed.

Railroad tracks were completed from Oklahoma City to Shawnee by July 4, 1895, and railroad shops became one of the young city's principal industries.

Oklahoma Baptist University opened in Shawnee in 1910, and its first building, Shawnee Hall, was a gift from the citizens of the town.

The Benedictine St. Gregory's University, founded in 1875 at Sacred Heart, relocated to Shawnee in 1915 and operated there for a century before closing in 2017.

After decades of rivalry with Tecumseh, Shawnee finally won the Pottawatomie County seat in a special election on December 19, 1930, decided by about a 90-vote margin; the New Deal-funded courthouse opened on July 6, 1935.

Shawnee once competed for Oklahoma's permanent state capital, finishing a distant third in the statewide vote.

The Mabee-Gerrer Museum of Art, one of the oldest museums in Oklahoma, sits on Oklahoma Baptist University's Green Campus — the former St. Gregory's campus — with collections spanning Egyptian, Medieval, Renaissance, and Native American art.