Portland's Lost Waterfront

In mid-April 1861 a group of local lads formed a boating club, which they named the “Regatta   Club.” It so happened that about this time the Willamette River went into a semi flood stage, and a boathouse in Oregon City came loose and floated down to Swan Island. Seeing a fine opportunity the members of the newly formed nautical association made arrangements with the owner of the boathouse to purchase it at a greatly reduced price should they be able to salvage it, and bring it up to Portland. At that time there was a farmer living on the island who claimed that he had grown up there since he was a “waif.” Furthermore he claimed that he had long ago claimed the island as his own, and declared his sole right as sovereign of the isle to claim as flotsam any items that washed ashore on his beach. It was upon this right that the “agriculturalist” (as the Oregonian put it) laid claim to the boathouse. Undeterred by these proofs the lads (Did I mention they were stout chaps,...

This being my 100th post I will wax poetic. What I offer below is my own weak attempt to turn one of Portland's undying pieces of folklore B.S. into folk song. I have turned this lyric over to some songsters to see if they can come up with something. My left hand is almost useless right now . This prevented me from doing this on my own, accompanied by my tenor guitar and banjolele. The story is no older than the 1930s and Stewart Holbrook's marvelous experiment to hoodwink the public with yarns that he attributed to old timers. This tale he told several different ways, always changing the number of corpses involved.  For the record: According to the City Directory there was no saloon in Portland called the "Snug Harbor" nor was there ever a "Johnson & Son" undertaker. According to maritime records there was no ship named the "Flying Prince" registered during the late 19th century; but I happened to notice a famous race horse with that name ...

What I hope my readers will find as fascinating as I did is this, another first hand report of Jim Turk boarding a ship on its arrival in Portland. The incident takes place around 1880 and the teller of the tale is Frank Thomas Bullen, a British sailor who later became a famous writer of sea stories. At the beginning of the 20 th century Frank Bullen was as famous as any other writer of his day. He wrote about the two things that mattered to him most: the sea and God. He went to sea at the age of 12 and over the years he rose to the rank of first mate. His first book, The Cruise of the Cachalot: Around the Word After Sperm Whales , was first published in 1898 by Smith, Elder & Company . In a world where the works of Melville were devoured by an adventure-craving public Frank Bullen’s semi autobiographical works found high favor. In the new world of the American west it was a time when the “sons of perdition” had run their course. The era of unbridled vice h...

The Evil Deeds of Darkness An Evening in Whitechapel and Its Celebrated Resorts of Crime and Dissipation This article was written by an unnamed Oregonian reporter and appeared in the Sunday Oregonian , May 14, 1893. Note: Please try to overlook the racial insensitivity in a few remarks. It is mild compared to many news articles from the period. I added paragraph breaks. The article had none, and was a bit difficult to read. I believe this article is a valuable first hand account of the life in the North End at the beginning of the 1890s.   When darkness has settled down upon the western Heights and blotted from sight the near and distant scenes of which Portlanders love to tell, there is still presented to the eye a beautiful view, for art takes possession of the landscape nature leaves to rest.  Spread out at one’s feet is a vast sea of deep, mysterious darkness, interspersed with glistening points of a radiance—brilliant arcs scattered here and there, long ro...