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street roots
Education * Dialogue* Independence
Murnane Wharf, Marvin Ricks remembered with honors
Michael M unk is an
' author and. a form er
professor o f political
science. He is the author
o f “The Portland Red
Guide," a guide to
Portland's radical past.
Marvin Ricks
BY MICHAEL MUNK
C O N T R IB U T IN G C O L U M N IS T
here is sad news and good news for
Portland and its waterfront Sad is
that Marvin Ricks, the last surviving .
Portland veteran of the great 1934 west
coast dock strike died at age 97, Without the
struggles of labor heroes like the young
Brother Ricks, there would be no
International Longshore & Warehouse
Union. (ILWU) and no official memorial to
one of its local leaders now threatened by
the relocation of the Saturday Market.
But good is the chance that the Memorial
plaque honoring
Francis J. Murnane
above the floating
wharf named for him
will be replaced by the
Portland Development
Commission with the
cooperation of
Portland Parks.
Richard Engeman, a
member of the
Portland Historic
Landmarks
Commission reports
his efforts to restore
the memorial seem to
be succeeding,
although a public
for destruction. The wharf is named after
announcement has not former ILWU Local 8 President Murnane
been made. Officially
and is Oregon’s only public monument to a
sited by vote of the .
union worker.
City Council at the
Brother Murnane worked tirelessly to
foot of SW Ankeney
advance the cause of working families, end
Street just south of
poverty,, and restore many of Portland’s
the Burnside Bridge,
treasured historical monuments for future
the Murnane Wharf
generations. These monuments include
was either forgotten or ignored in the
Pittock mansion, the Benson fountains,
recent relocation of, the Saturday Market.
Skidmore Fountain, the Campbell .....
The bronze plaque had disappeared.
firefighter’s memorial, and many more.
Replacement of the Murnane memorial
We have petitions in our union halls for
plaque would honor not only Murnane
members arid friends to sign. It says:
himself, but all the militant longshoremen
; “We ask that the Murnane wharf be
like Marvin Ricks who built their union into 1 restored with a plaque to replace the orie
a model for America’s workers.
that is missing. If the wharf cannot be
Street Roots first called attention to the
restored, we ask that an equivalent
Murnane Wharf scandal in itsMarch 20
monument in Portland be named in honor of
edition. After The Oregonian picked up the
Francis J. Murnane. We ask that any
story a month later, Saturday Market’s Sue
monument to Brother Murnane be as large
Kenny said she hoped to organize an event
as his personality, as beautiful and visible as
supporting its restoration.'
the monuments he saved for Portland, and
ILWU Local 8 President Jeff Smith sent
that it carries a plaque that contains the
out an appeal on behalf of several Portland
exact language as the original plaque that
ILWU locals:
was dedicated by the City in 1979.”
Members of ILWU Locals 8 (Longshore),
Commissioner Engeman- learned from
40 (Supercargoes & Clerks) and 92
city planner Dave Skilton that Portland
(Walking Bosses and Foremen) are
Parks believes the plaque ,was stolen prior
concerned that the Francis J. Murnane
to the market construction. In 1989, the
memorial wharf, which was dedicated in
Portland Development Cortunission spent
Portland by Harry Bridges in 1979, is slated
$500 to replace the original plaque and the
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PDC appears ready to restore it again.
Mayor Potter had begun such efforts before,
he left office, but it would seem clear that
the city is obligated to maintain its own
memorials sucn as the Murnane Wharf.
In the midst o£ these developments the
last Portland veteran of the 1934 “Big
Strike” died June 10 at age 97. Ricks was a
young longshoreman who joined the
strikers’ “riot squads’’ which discouraged
.scahs from crossing union picket lines and
fought the shippers’ vigilantes. He was the
last survivor of over 1,000 Portland
dockworkers who won their, demands in the
historic strike 75 years ago.
His death came Shortly before members
and their families of the ILWU’s Columbia
River District, which also includes Local 5 at
Powell’s books, will gather at Oaks Park July
5 to commemorate “Bloody Thursday,” the
day in 1934 when police killed two strikers
in San Francisco. Ricks had been an annual
speaker at that event, reminding today’s
union members of the struggle that won
them one of the nation’s most progressive
unions. He would also tell them that
Portland had its own “Bloody Wednesday”
on July 12,1934 when police wounded four
strikers while trying to force a train through
picket lines at Terminal 4.
The Murnane
Wharf perched off
the west bank o f the
Willamette River.