Portland's Lost Waterfront

I suppose every town has local legends that are fabrications that turn into "hard fact" with the multiplicity of their retelling. Portland has many of these, which is a shame because they detract from a fascinating history that is far more interesting than worn out fictions. In this post I will mention only one. There are many more, but I have to start somewhere. Here is the tale of Nancy Boggs as it was related to Stuart Holbrook by "Spider" Johnson, the loquacious bouncer and bar keep from Erickson's Working Man's Saloon that once stood on 3rd and Burnside. If you enjoy fiction you can read it a number of other places with varying details, this is the bare bones version: Nancy was a madame who kept a "whiskey scow" that was a bawdy house as well. It was a two-storied affair that she painted "Nile green and bright red." She would keep it on the west side until the police started harassing women of her sort, then she would move ...