Stephen William Shaw (December 15, 1817 – February 12, 1900) was a California '49er and portrait painter who helped discover and name Humboldt Bay and introduced viticulture to Sonoma County by 1864.

[2] A year later, in Baton Rouge, Shaw painted a portrait of General Zachary Taylor which won a silver medal at the American Institute.

Becalmed for five weeks, they reached Acapulco July 6 where the passengers forced the owners off the boat[8] due to poor provisioning and overcrowding.

[2] Huntington, a large group of fellow passengers, and Stephen Shaw immediately went to the gold mines at Mormon Island[2] for about six months, then Shaw moved to Sacramento for February and March 1850,[3] where he met future judge Edwin B. Crocker, brother of railroad baron Charles Crocker, for whom he would paint more than 25 portraits of notable Californians.

[1] In the early part of March 1850, Shaw left San Francisco on the schooner Laura Virginia, under Captain Douglas Ottenger.

The six men walked down the beach, were ferried across the Mad River by Indians, and camped for the night on the spit north of the entrance to Humboldt Bay.

[14][17] On April 26, 1850, the San Francisco Daily Journal of Commerce published a wood engraving based on his sketches of Humboldt Bay.

[18] In 1851, Shaw spent much of the year with John Augustus Sutter at Hock Farm on the Feather River as the family portrait painter[19] and general business agent.

[1] Shaw was a member of the Masons,[2] the Society of California Pioneers, The Bohemian Club,[3] the Mechanics' Institute[34] and the San Francisco Art Association.