Category Archives: History

By Nancy Varekamp | CNews Editor

Vanport isn’t history to Ed Washington. The 84-year-old Concordian’s four years there helped lay his foundation for embracing education, civil rights and civic engagement.

In 1944, when he was seven, Ed’s family moved from Alabama to Vanport to join his father who was employed at Henry J. Kaiser’s Oregon Shipbuilding Corporation. Oregon’s second largest city was filled with apartments, schools, community centers and clinics.

“What I remember most about it was just the number of people there, though it wasn’t like we were all crawling all over each other. There were so many activities in Vanport, particularly in summer. There was never a lack of things to do.

“The schools were so wonderful.” One vivid memory was his class planting gourd seeds in early May 1948, in preparation for September harvesting, drying and painting. The flood took the garden, the entire city, most personal belongings and the lives of at least a dozen people.

From one of many evacuation buses on Denver Avenue, he witnessed the berm give way to the wall of water.

His family slept that night in a school cafeteria, then two weeks in a church before a longer stay in converted Army barracks on Swan Island.

Ed attributes much of his commitment to community to his mother. She raised seven children in those uncertain times. And she taught him the importance of family and community. While in Vanport – and even after the family’s stay on Swan Island – George H. Oberteuffer served as Boy Scout mentor to Ed.

Obie told him, “Things are not what they should be for you and for people that look like you and your brothers. But Eddie, I don’t want you to ever get discouraged, because things are going to change. When those changes start, I want you and your brothers to be prepared.’”

Two moves later, Ed attended Irvington Elementary School, where his teacher led field trips to the Legislature, county courthouse, city hall and elsewhere.

“I learned how government worked from Mrs. [Hazel] Hill. I used to take kids on trips like the ones she took us on to experience much of what I had.”

Ed began practicing what she taught him during his successful campaigns for Grant High School class president, and much later to the Metro Council.

His dedication to civic involvement and civil rights – including presidency of the local NAACP – grew over the years. He’s still going strong, serving as director of Community Outreach and Engagement for the Portland State University Office of Global Diversity & Inclusion, among a flurry of other commitments.

Editor’s note: Space here doesn’t allow for many of Ed’s memories. For additional details, visit ConcordiaPDX.org/EdWashington. For oral histories from him and fellow Vanport survivors, visit VanportMosaic.org/the-living-archive/ category/Oral+History. 

By Doug Decker | Historian

Editor’s note: Historian-turned-teacher Doug Decker offers a new chapter each Monday in neighborhood history for students continuing their schooling at home. Visit Home History School at AlamedaHistory.org for archived and new lesson plans. One May Monday, he offered the history lesson below related to the area’s oldest living residents: trees.

Portland has more than 300 Heritage Trees, which have a special designation because of their unique size, age or historical significance. Northeast Portland neighborhoods have a great cluster of Heritage Trees north of Broadway Street, east of Interstate Avenue, south of Killingsworth Street and west of 33rd Avenue.

A bunch are probably within walking distance of you, so it’s time to meet some of them, especially one of our favorites, the Pearson Pine at 29th Avenue and Fremont Street.

Long ago, before neighborhoods existed on these lands, there were forests of Douglas-fir, hemlock, western red cedar, alder, maple and even pine that blanketed these lands. Gradually many of those trees were cut either for lumber or to make room for the farm fields and orchards that followed.

And then 100 years ago, when most of our neighborhoods were just taking shape, the people who built our streets and houses figured the new homeowners would want tree-lined streets. But they knew it would take a while, so they planted many different kinds. Some of those have gotten old and big.

One such tree is the big Ponderosa pine at the southwest corner of 29th Avenue and Alameda Street. A few years back, I nominated that tree to Portland’s heritage tree list after learning its story, which goes something like this:

Back in about 1885, there was a forest fire that burned through this area and killed many trees, young and old, but left some trees untouched. After the fire, a local farmer named Samuel Pearson – who used to run a dairy that stood about where Alameda School is today – found one of these young seedlings that survived the fire: a Ponderosa pine tree, which is much more common in eastern Oregon.

Because it was different than most of the other trees around here, Samuel knew it would always stand out, so he planted it in a special place to mark the corner of his property. Today, it’s a giant, visible from all around.

His dairy and cows are long gone, but Samuel was right: that tree sure stands out. So do all of the other Heritage Trees in the neighborhood.

For additional research sources on Heritage Trees, click here.

Heritage Trees activity suggestions & novelties

1. Have a look at the trees around your house. Can you tell which one is the tallest or the oldest? Ask around your family or your neighbors to see if you can learn when your trees were planted. (One family who lived in our house planted a live Christmas tree in front of our house back in the 1970s and it grew tall before it had to be removed).
2. How about your neighborhood? Can you tell which trees are the tallest or the oldest? Have they been trimmed to make way for the power lines? Can you see old scars where branches may have broken off in the snow, ice or wind?
3. Here’s something that might be fun. See if you can identify the species of trees you have around your house or on your block. There are many clues to look at when you identify your tree: the shape of its leaves (or needles), the texture of its bark, its shape and size, its flowers, cones, seeds or fruit. Check out this helpful tree identification tool.
4. Which is your favorite tree in your neighborhood? Why? How have you seen it change? Draw a picture of your favorite tree.
5. Draw a map that shows the different trees around your house or on your block and what kind they are.
6. Go visit the Pearson Pine and stand underneath its branches. Did you know this is one of the oldest living things in our area? What stories do you think it could tell?
7. Did you know trees all have different sounds as the winds blow through? Next windy day, listen carefully.
8. Here’s a link to the map of some local Heritage Trees. Choose a few to visit and find your favorite.

Doug Decker initiated his blog AlamedaHistory.org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present.

By Doug Decker | Historian

I’ve been watching two commercial corners just a few blocks apart that share similar histories but are on very different pathways to the future. They pose a question worth pondering: what do we want our neighborhood to feel like in the future?

The old Logan Grocery structure at 33rd Avenue and Alberta Street, built in 1910, is slated for demolition to be replaced by a three-story, 19-unit, short-term Airbnb hotel.

Meanwhile, a few blocks over, at the northeast corner of 30th Avenue and Emerson Street, a similar but very different story is unfolding.

Here, a 107-year-old wood-frame, mixed-use, commercial building that was once also a grocery store is being restored and re-purposed for a medical practice and neighborhood coffee shop.

Both buildings – and most 100-year-old-plus buildings – have foundations that need work. For the Logan Grocery building, it was a deal breaker, and the owner chose to start over through demolition.

At 30th and Emerson, with similar infrastructure, the owner chose to renovate. That work begins with major foundation and structural work and then completely renovating the interior and using the existing exterior building envelope.

That offers a contrast between old and new while staying at the same scale as the surrounding neighborhood. The clinic and a new coffee shop are to occupy the first floor. Glass roll-up garage doors in the coffee shop on the north face of the building are planned to open onto an open outdoor patio. Upstairs are apartments, much like the old days.

Our neighborhood continues to wrestle with growth, density, affordability, traffic and many other pressures and needs. I hope we can bring a memory, an appreciation and a sense of our past forward with us to help create a better future.

This will be my last piece as your “Ask the historian” columnist. Thanks for caring about Concordia history. It’s been a fun and enlightening five years. I step aside from CNews to make room for continued teaching, research and scholarship about our collective public history. I invite you to follow my continuing northeast Portland early history explorations on my blog AlamedaHistory.org, where I’m always available to respond to inquiries and observations about our past.

Doug Decker initiated his blog AlamedaHistory.org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present.

By Doug Decker | Historian

The old green building at 33rd Avenue and Alberta Street says “Notice of 120-day delay for demolition.” That means the building is about to be torn down and replaced by condominiums.

Here’s the story: The 109-year-old grocery store building, built before both streets were paved, is slated for demolition and will be replaced by a three-story, mixed-use condominium and office building.

Developer Bob Bochsler of Box Real Estate Holdings in Portland expects demolition to take place in 2020 with construction to follow soon thereafter. Although drawings for the new structure are not yet complete, he envisions a building with a pitched roof and an inner courtyard facing Alberta. “I want to be in keeping with the Pacific Northwest style,” he said.

When the developer first approached the project, he said he wanted to consider ways to utilize the existing building. Adaptive reuse, however, was not cost effective, due to costs associated with reinforcing the foundation.

The property is ranked in the City of Portland Historic Resource Inventory, which recognizes its significance for potential historic register designation. However, because past owners never listed the property in the National Register of Historic Places, it may be torn down after a brief delay.

Operated from the 19-teens until the 1940s as Logan’s Grocery, the building cycled through multiple owners from the 1950s through the 1970s, known as Zwhalen’s Grocery and then as Romoli’s. From the late 1970s until recently, the building contained the studio and residence of noted Portland artist Jay Backstrand.

Concordian Bob Wilson, grandson of former storekeepers Anna and Earl Logan, has fond memories of the store from its heyday. In recent correspondence, Wilson shared these memories:

“When I was a small child, my grandparents lived in the house just south of the store. My grandmother would fix lunch every day for my grandfather Earl and bring it over to him.

“Earl was the storekeeper. Anna was the butcher for the store. As a small boy it was so much fun to be with my grandparents, and then to go over to their store and see all of the people who dropped by.”

I’m collecting memories and photos of the life of this old building and welcome hearing from any CNews readers who have a story or photo to share.

Doug Decker initiated his blog Alamedahistory.org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present.

Ask the historian is a CNews standing feature that encourages readers to ask questions about the history of the neighborhood and its buildings. Is there something you’ve wondered about? Drop a line to CNewsEditor@ ConcordiaPDX.org and ask Doug Decker to do some digging.

By Doug Decker | Historian

The Concordia neighborhood is a quilt of underlying subdivisions, also known as plats filed by developers more than 100 years ago when they first laid out – and then carved out – streets and lots from the fields and forests that occupied these gentle slopes above the Columbia River.

My June column mentioned Foxchase, one of those plats. But there are many more, each one with its own history: Kennedy’s Addition, Ina Park, Lester Park, Town of Creighton, Heidelberg, Sunderland Acres, Concordia Green and the largest of all, Irvington Park.

Interesting, isn’t it, that the makers of our neighborhood wanted to name it after another neighborhood that already exists? That’s marketing for you.

The Irvington Park plat occupies the area from 25th to 33rd avenues, between Rosa Parks Way and Killingsworth Street, an area of about 175 acres. That’s big by northeast Portland plat standards.

When the Irvington Park plat was filed back in November 1890, the Irvington neighborhood we know today south of Fremont Street was already a going concern with wide streets, big houses and wealthy business people moving in and building up the area. Today we would say property values there were definitely skyrocketing.

The initial developer of Irvington Park here in Concordia in 1890, Edward Quackenbush, liked the vibe of the original Irvington – which he was not party to, by the way – and wanted to cash in on the coattails of its identity, something that other east Portland developers tried to do as well.

Check out the adjacent advertisement from The Oregonian July 10, 1907, that implies a connection with “Irvington Proper,” but also points out that prices in Irvington Park are way less expensive.

Other eastside developers did the same thing, which was annoying for the Irvington real estate people. But it worked.

With the help of the Alberta Streetcar, homeowners flocked to Irvington Park and the commercial district around Alberta Street boomed. A community club was organized, a club house and dancing venue was built near 30th Avenue and Ainsworth Street.

And something else happened: community spirit. Here’s a paragraph from The Oregonian July 25, 1915:

“There never was a finer feeling in a community than now exists in Irvington Park – and their community club has done it and its work will go on benefitting one and all and bringing them closer and closer together.”

Ask the Historian is a CNews standing feature that encourages readers to ask questions about the history of the neighborhood and its buildings. Is there something you’ve wondered about? Drop a line to CNewsEditor@ ConcordiaPDX.org and ask Doug Decker to do some digging.

Doug Decker initiated his blog AlamedaHistory.org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present.

By Doug Decker | Historian

If someone asked you to find Foxchase on a map, could you? Here’s a clue: it was one of a dozen different subdivisions created more than 100 years ago which, taken together today, make up what we think of as the Concordia neighborhood. (For a visual clue, check out the 1954 photo on this page.)

Foxchase (not Fox Chase) was a subdivision platted in 1889 by J. Carroll McCaffrey that contains 15 square blocks, from Alberta to Killingsworth streets between 29th and 33rd avenues. Today, some might refer to the 30th-Killingsworth intersection as Foxchase, but it’s actually a much larger chunk of the neighborhood.

McCaffrey was a Georgetown-educated attorney, born and raised in Philadelphia, who kept a small practice there as well as here in Portland. He and wife Eugenie were busy on the social scene in both communities and frequent travelers back and forth.

Speculating in property was his specialty and he was getting ready for Portland’s boom times by buying up nearby open lands.

At that point in our history, there wasn’t much up here on these gentle slopes of the Columbia Slough and the Columbia River beyond. Fields, forests, a few dairies here and there, Homestead Act claims from the 1860s held by a couple dozen families.

Alberta was a dirt track meandering 10 blocks between what is now Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard (Union Avenue then) and what is today’s 15th Avenue.

McCaffrey sold lots in Foxchase and used that money to buy up other open land for the eventual grids of streets and lots that would follow.

Fox Chase is the name of a comfortable neighborhood in northeast Philadelphia, named for an 18th century inn. During McCaffrey’s timeframe of reference – the 1870s-1880s – Philadelphia’s rich and famous were building their mansions in Fox Chase. He and Eugenie were trying to call that to mind.

McCaffrey turned out to be a scoundrel who was arrested and imprisoned for land fraud. Homebuilding in the Foxchase plat didn’t really take off until after the turn of the century, years after his departure from Portland and his death.

But the name stuck and seems to be experiencing a bit of a renaissance at the moment. For more on McCaffrey and a look at the Foxchase plat, visit AlamedaHistory.org and enter “Foxchase” in the search box.

Doug Decker is taking a breather during the August and September CNews issues. But don’t let that discourage you from sending in questions about the history of the neighborhood and its buildings. Drop a line to CNewsEditor@ConcordiaPDX.org. CNews will save them for when Doug resumes and ask him to do some digging.

Doug Decker initiated his blog AlamedaHistory.org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present.

By Doug Decker | Historian

I’ve been fortunate recently to spend some time with Jeanne Allen, a 98-year-old neighbor whose sharp and clear memory reaches well back into her childhood days here in northeast Portland.

As we chatted about change during a recent drive through the neighborhood, Jeanne talked about how different things were around here in the early years. Pointing out a small home toward the back of one lot, she said something that required some follow-up:

“I sure hate to see the orchard houses going away.”

Wait. What’s an orchard house? We’ve never heard that term. We want to know more.

When Jeanne and her husband Bob built their home in Concordia back in 1950, they were surrounded by orchards of cherries, apricots, pears and apples that were planted in the early 1900s.

Most of the streets in the surrounding area between Prescott and Killingsworth streets and 42nd and 33rd avenues weren’t paved. Some hadn’t even been constructed.

Jeanne remembers simple small buildings scattered out among the orchards that served as temporary quarters for those tending the orchards during the year and harvesting during the fall. She didn’t call them shacks, but that’s a term that comes to mind.

She and her family always called these little places “orchard houses,” which was a commonly known term and function during those years.

They took a simple form:
• Shed-roofed front and back porch
• Entry door in the middle and a backdoor lined up out the back
• Bedroom and window on one side
• Open living space on the other • Maybe a counter for food preparation
• Often oriented in an unusual way on the lot, either toward the back or sitting at an angle

Pictured is one Jeanne knows for certain was an orchard house. In fact, she remembers the actual nearby orchard. Plumbing was added to the house in 1924, when it was described as an old one-story frame residence.

Do you know of any orchard houses? There are likely just a small handful left and we’d like to document them and explore their stories. If you have one in mind – or think you know a candidate – send along a photo or address c/o CNewsEditor@ConcordiaPDX.org.

Doug Decker initiated his blog AlamedaHistory. org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present. If you have a question for him to answer in CNews, send it to CNewsEditor@ConcordiaPDX.

Ask the Historian is a CNews standing feature that encourages readers to ask questions about the history of the neighborhood and its buildings. Is there something you’ve wondered about? Drop a line to CNewsEditor@ConcordiaPDX.org and ask Doug Decker to do some digging.

By Doug Decker | Historian

The question: We live on 35th and Ainsworth in a home built in 1941 and – like the rest of our neighbors between 33rd and 37th circling the blocks of Ainsworth and Simpson – we all have lots 50 by 230 feet. Why do you suppose the lots on this block were platted so long?
– Rose and John Yandell

The historian reports: The long, narrow configuration of this block stems from decisions made more than 100 years ago by John D. Kennedy. He once owned much of the property between Killingsworth and Ainsworth streets, and 33rd and 42nd avenues, and Kennedy School was named for him.

The Irishman immigrated to Oregon in 1866, found his way to Baker City and worked in and then owned a dry goods store.

After coming to Portland about 1881, Kennedy bought this property, originally part of the 1855 Isaac Rennison Donation Land Claim. It was outside the city limits and far from any developments.

Kennedy was ahead of his time in the market. Northeast Portland’s ripeness for real estate didn’t take place until the years after the 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition, when it seemed anyone who could was buying property or building houses.

But Kennedy had platted these lands as the Kennedy Addition back in 1890, a grid of 15 square blocks with more than 200 lots. Two years later, he platted Kennedy’s Second Addition, adjacent to the east, with room for another 120 homes.

Several other nearby plats were filed about that time, but they were also just lines on paper. There was no market yet for residential development. So, in 1906, city council approved his petition to “vacate” five of the blocks in his addition. That officially eliminated platted streets, even if they didn’t yet exist – like all of the north-south streets in the block between Ainsworth and Simpson, from 33rd east to 37th.

Kennedy’s stated rationale was to sell the larger chunk of land as acreage for farm fields.

As urbanization spread in the years that followed, neighborhoods were built to the north, south and west, but the 12-acre parcel – with no north-south through streets – stayed as one big block in farm use.

Kennedy died in December 1936. In 1938 the property was controlled by Ward D. Cook, a Portland insurance and real estate agent, who designated 80 lots on the long block ready for construction.

After World War II the market truly picked up. Most of the houses were built and sold between 1940 and 1950.

So there you have it. In the original Kennedy’s Addition plat, that one long block was going to be five blocks. But then Kennedy did away with the blocks to better sell the property, which he never did.

The market came and went and came back again. Then another speculator saw opportunity and turned the island of farm into the more than 50 lots there today, most of them a very long and narrow quarter-acre each. Read more and check out maps and historic aerial photos on this topic at AlamedaHistory.org.

Ask the historian is a CNews standing feature that encourages readers to ask questions about the history of the neighborhood and its buildings. Is there something you’ve wondered about? Drop a line to CNewsEditor@ConcordiaPDX. org and ask Doug Decker to do some digging.

By Doug Decker | Historian

Last month, we reported on Vernon School in anticipation of its 111th anniversary. Speaking of Vernon, doesn’t Vernon Avenue sound like a street that you should know its location – especially since Portland has an entire neighborhood named Vernon?

That street name is just an echo today because the actual Vernon Avenue was silenced Sept. 2, 1931. That’s when city council passed Ordinance 61325 readdressing all of Portland’s streets and calling for multiple street name changes.

Before the renumbering ordinance, there was no predictable and systematic addressing system, which left everyone confused, including police, fire and the U.S. Postal Service. The great readdressing of Portland’s streets in 1931 was long overdue and helpful. But losing the name of your street, that one really stung.

That street name is just an echo today because the actual Vernon Avenue was silenced Sept. 2, 1931.

One of the 1931 rules aimed at orderliness required that streets between any consecutively numbered street – in our case between 14th and 15th avenues, which is where Vernon Avenue existed – had to be renamed with a number and given the designation “Place.”

As a result, the six-block Vernon Avenue went extinct and became today’s 14th Place, running between Prescott and Killingsworth streets.

In January 1933, neighbors along Vernon Avenue – angry about the change and still using their original addresses in resistance – presented a petition to city council protesting the switch. But city council denied the petition, saying an exception could not be made.

We haven’t yet come across anything on the record about how neighbors responded to that denial. Eventually the passage of time dulled the loss as Vernon Avenue families grew old, grew up and moved on. But it’s worth noting that stories in The Oregonian, well into the 1940s, referred to addresses on Vernon Avenue when reporting births, marriages, deaths and social occasions.

Long live Vernon Avenue!

Doug Decker initiated his blog AlamedaHistory.org in 2007 to collect and share knowledge about the life of old houses, buildings and neighborhoods in northeast Portland. His basic notion is that insight to the past adds new meaning to the present. If you have a question for him to answer in CNews, send it to CNewsEditor@ConcordiaPDX. com.