Vendors
Page 6
o
C EN TR A L C lt Y
COFFEE
¡D\inh,iuell.3)o-foocL.
Sourcing & roasting craft coffee to
benefit programs at Central City Concern.
IN STORES
New Seasons Market, Whole Foods, Food Front
Cooperative Grocery, Green Zebra, Chuck's
Produce and Will Leather Goods.
AT YOUR OFFICE
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make that happen. 503.226.7387
ON OUR WEBSITE
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Answers to puzzles on page 15
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9 Z 6 P
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6 8 9 9
Z P 9 6
L 9 P 8
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8 Z 8 P 6
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Street Roots • August 12-18, 2016
marijuana.
After the arrests, the hippie subculture
moved from Lair Hill Park to other city
areas.
“It moved to Washington Park, then to
LaurelhursL Then it w ent down to (Lovejoy)
Fountain. Everybody moved down there.
BY LEONORA KO
S T A FF W R IT E R
Then from th ere on it moved up to Uncle
Andy’s which was a restaurant up there
t was 1963 and Ron B ritt was a teenager
(near) Portland State. And th e movement
who had just moved from the Haight-
ju st kept moving. Because you know
Ashbury district in San Francisco to his
everybody’s dealing drugs outside and the
parents’ home on Corbett Street, Portland. cops ju st kept pushing everybody out of
“I was in th e first hippie movement
there.
here,” said Ron. “The first hippie park was
“It was beautiful at first. Then the hard
Lair Hill Park, down on Barbur Boulevard,
drugs came into it - heroin and speed - and
right there by Corbett Street.”
made it evil. I got strung out on heroin,
In those days, Lair Hill Park was an area
started using hard drugs,” he said in a
with low rents and relative tolerance,
low voice.
according to Ron. The original Italian and
Ron found help through
Jewish immigrants were moving out and
Portland’s first methadone clinic.
\
artists and young people were moving in.
“Doctor Larsen ran the
New businesses sprang up in the area: the
methadone clinic, CODA,
Psychedelic Superm arket sold drug ,
down there across the
paraphernalia, the M erchants of Warm
provided counseling services to youth and
Nature’s sold natural groceries, he said.
“I was p art of the movement, the radical
protests,” said Ron. “P rotest th e Vietnam
war, wear flowers in your hair, smoke p o t”
Lair Hill Park became an area with
spontaneous jam sessions and communal
soup gatherings.
Ron reminisced, “It was a good time to
live. The world seem ed like it was full of
peace and love.”
In 1968, rum ors th at 20,000
hippies were about to descend
on Portland spurred th e City
Council to take action. The
police made dozens of
drug arrests in the
area.
Ron said, “Yeah, I
was selling bags of
weed, taking LSD
and sitting on the
backstop of the
baseball diamond.
And getting busted
by th e cops since I
■
was selling
VENDOR PROFILE
Ron Britt
I
bridge. I was the 125th person with the
program back then. And then I w ent to
Allied (Health Services).”
He was on the streets for 30 years. After
a bad cocaine episode, Ron decided to quit
all hard drugs: “I decided I didn’t w ant to
die. And so I just stopped.”
Based on his years of experience, his
advice to other vendors is to keep looking
up, smile and be nice to custom ers. Ron
usually sells the new spaper on Fridays near
Hotel Monaco on the corner of Southwest
Fifth Avenue and Southwest Washington
S tre e t
These days, he is no longer living on the
streets of Lair Hill Park and has an
apartm ent over Street Roots,
thanks to Cascade Mental
■
Health.
I -'
A s f°r ^ e Lair Hill Park
area, the neighborhood
lobbied the city to iftclude
I' it as one of the first
lb/historical districts in
^P ortland.
I
Ron said: “It was all full
f t f hippies, now it’s all
yuppies. All the old hippies
bought hom es there
:ause back in those days
ou could get a house for
nothing.
I
“It’d take two arm s
and fifteen legs to pay
H for a house nowadays.”
'OB
Ice Cream for Street Roots!
Order ice cream!
Preorder pints of ice cream online from
Monday, August 1st to Friday, August
14th.
Order at: street-roots.rayshopify.com
$9 a pint. Proceeds go to support Street
Roots,
Ice cream party with Street Roots!
Pick up ice cream!
When: Thursday, Sept. 1st from 5-8 p.m
Pints of ice cream will be available for pickup
Where: 3540 N. Williams, What’s the Scoop?
at What's the Scoop?, from Thursday,
There will also be a limited quantity of pints available at
September 3rd through Friday,
the doorl What's the Scoop? will be donating 10% of sales September 11th,
during the party!