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| A photo I took of T5 from a water taxi while doing stowage area exams on ships anchored in the Columbia |
In my book, "Portland's Lost Waterfront," I have a section
devoted to the O. R. & N., Pacific Coast Grain Elevator System, often
called the "great grain pipe." This was a system of grain elevators following
the rail lines up the Columbia River basin, with tendrils reaching out as far
as Idaho.
Today this system is duplicated in many ways by the Japanese
owned, Columbia Grain International, a company with elevators reaching as far
as North Dakota. Since the 1970s this company has operated the gargantuan Terminal 5
grain elevator near the mouth of the Willamette. This one grain elevator is
responsible for a large percentage of Oregon's total exports, and a
surprisingly large percentage of the entire nation's wheat exports.
This industrial giant
pulls grain from hundreds of railcars each day—up its whirring and rattling
"legs" and into the concrete fortress of its warehouse. Bulk cargo carriers from the Orient and beyond
move up the Columbia river by tug and into the CGI slip. Rain and shine, by
daylight, or by the glow of hundreds of halogen lamps, the grain pours into the
holds of these carriers. Since this elevator is on property belonging to the
Port of Portland, and due to a complexity of agreements and memorandums of
understanding with the International Longshore Workers Union, all the jobs,
aside from management, security, some high voltage electricians, and USDA, are
held by longshoremen—even down to sweeping with a broom to get the grain dust
that makes its persistent way past the vacuum collectors to settle, like a fine
white frost, over everything.
The elevator is a big machine run mostly from a control room
in a nearby building. Since most of the machinery is operated by remote
controls this huge operation only needs a crew of about 20 workers to provide
the labor There are workers on board the ship running the controls that move
the giant spouts that pour the grain into the holds. There are two rail dumps,
each with its full-sized locomotive. These locomotives are run by switchmen
who use a remote control box, much like those used to operate model airplanes.
There is a barge unloading facility, and a "truck pit" where hopper
trucks drop their burden, and where semi tractors-trailer rigs are hoisted by a hydraulic
"tipper" to a 40 degree angle so the grain slides out and into a pit
where belts and legs take it away. All of this activity is overseen by a
longshore "boss" who makes sure the workers sent from the hiring hall
make it to their various jobs. This boss oversees the whole shooting match so
that it hums like some futurist, heavy metal bee hive.
Some years back, maybe ten, maybe fifteen, there was a boss
whose initials were E.T., and those initials became the only name by which he
was known. E.T. was one of those "hands on" kind of personalities—the
kind who need to know every detail of everything, and who become quite
disturbed by anything out of the ordinary. I recall a mystery that occurred
during E.T.'s tenure that is quite unforgettable.
It was one of our duties, as USDA inspectors, to tour the
inner parts of the elevator from time to time to make certain the system was
delivering grain to the proper shipping bins dedicated to export cargo. During
these tours we began to notice bare footprints in the thin layer of grain dust
on the floor. The footprints would lead into off limits areas, and areas with
dangerous, high voltage machinery. E.T. may have even been the first to notice
these footprints.
Then the whispering began, someone had seen a
"Chinaman" creeping around up in the upper reaches of the elevator. Some
said that he must have escaped from one of the ships and was now living up
there until he could affect an escape beyond the gates of the T5 compound. When
these rumors reached E.T.'s ears he became obsessed and could even be heard
muttering to himself as he wandered about, looking for the culprit—hoping all
the while that it wasn't a ghost, as some of the whispering declared.
The escaped Oriental crewman was not an implausible theory.
Most of the maritime workers are Oriental, and the larger number are Chinese,
who work for very low wages, by Western standards. It was entirely possible for
one of the crew members to get inside the tower that supports the shipping
spouts, climb up to the gantry that carries the belts to the dock area, and
hide himself in the labyrinth of the elevator warehouse. The proof that this
action had been carried out were these mysterious footprints that appeared each
day in different locations.
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| Terminal 5 Columbia Grain International Inc. Elevator |
E.T. would spend hours searching through the basement and up
to the bin tops. He looked into each corner beneath the shipping bins, each
holding 2 million pounds of wheat above his head. He examined beneath drag
conveyers, transformer rooms (off limits to all but the electricians), elevator
shafts, belt tunnels, toilets, but to no avail. For weeks, maybe even months,
the bare footprints continued to appear and E.T.'s obsession to find the
mysterious Oriental mariner became a monotonous compulsion.
Then one day, as one of us "Federal boys" was
making his rounds he came upon the longshoreman who usually operated the truck
pit. He was this well-liked fellow, a beanpole kind of guy, who wore Yosemite
Sam mustaches to hide is perpetually goofy grin. He was holding his work boots
in his hand, whistling softly to himself, while he tip-toed through the grain
dust.
Word spread quietly among the USDA workers that the mystery
of the Chinese ghost had been solved. So, as is the way of all gossip, the news
eventually reached the ears of E.T. himself, and the quest was abandoned.
This one turned out to be fake; but there have been other
hideouts and stowaways that were real, and, should I find the time, I will tell
you about them.
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