AREA VETERANS IN
THEIR OWN WORDS
WEEKEND BREAK • 1C
146TH YEAR, NO. 95
ONE DOLLAR
WEEKEND EDITION // FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2018
City’s
gamble
on hotel
lawsuit
pays off
Former operator’s
proceeds purchased
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
The city of Astoria has likely secured
nearly an extra $152,000 from the Astoria
Riverwalk Inn settlement after a wise gam-
ble on the outcome of the lawsuit.
Brad Smithart operated the inn between
2012 and 2015, racking up a massive amount
of back-due rent with the Port of Astoria,
transient room taxes with the city and prop-
erty taxes to Clatsop County.
In 2016, he confessed in court to owing
the city and agreed to a monthly repayment
plan. He has never made a payment, and the
city obtained judgment against him for more
than $118,000.
Param Hotel Corp., a Portland hotelier
that had tried and failed to take over Smi-
thart’s lease on the hotel in exchange for
paying his debts, successfully sued the Port
for breach of contract. Clatsop County Cir-
cuit Court Judge Dawn McIntosh in Decem-
ber ordered the Port to hand over the hotel
to Param by Nov. 1, and for the hotelier to
See HOTEL, Page 6A
Liberty Theatre
lands city loan
Major fundraising
event planned Saturday
By KATIE FRANKOWICZ
The Daily Astorian
The Liberty Theatre will receive city
money to help fund ongoing renovation at
the iconic downtown landmark.
The Astoria City Council — in its role
as the Astoria Development Commis-
sion, which oversees funds generated in
the Astor-East Urban Renewal District —
unanimously approved a $30,000 loan to
the theater at a special meeting Thursday
morning.
The commission met first in a closed ses-
sion to discuss the loan before publicly mak-
ing its decision. The city will also provide a
$30,000 grant.
See THEATRE, Page 6A
Ardi Chapman
William Carl Urell, second from left, was an Astorian and corporal in the Army’s 157th Aero Squadron repairing airplanes
on the Western Front during World War I.
‘HURRAH!!
HURRAH!!’
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
MORE INSIDE
Editor’s Notebook: ‘Imagining
the Great War, 100 years later’
‘W
e have a view of the
German trenches,”
wrote Otto Utzinger,
a doctor from Astoria,
in his diary Sept. 9, 1918, two weeks after
arriving on the front lines of World War I
in France.
“Enormous shell holes where the
Boche (Germans) dropped bombs yester-
day. A Boche shot down and dropped two
of our balloons.”
Utzinger, a graduate of Astoria High
School trained at Stanford University and
Johns Hopkins Medical School, was a
brain surgeon in mobile hospitals along
some of the active parts of the Western
Front near Verdun, France.
He was one of an estimated 300-plus
soldiers Clatsop County sent to serve in
the Great War. The county lost at least 34
killed in the conflict, which ended 100
years ago Sunday — the 11th hour of the
11th day of the 11th month of 1918.
Locals filled a wide variety of roles,
from doctors and farmers to pilots and
doughboys in the trenches.
Utzinger was a lieutenant colonel in
the Army Medical Corps from 1918 to
1920 and was awarded the Victory Medal
with four battle clasps.
James Goodwin was an able seaman
trained at Clatsop Station near Astoria.
He served aboard the SS Mongolia when
it was the first American vessel to test
Sunday is 100th
anniversary of
Armistice ending
World War I
Opinion • 4A
Clatsop County Historical Society
Dr. Otto Utzinger, an Astoria native,
operated on injured soldiers on the
Western Front during World War I.
a German blockade around the United
Kingdom in April 1917.
The Mongolia used one of its 6-inch
deck guns to drive off and possibly sink
a German U-boat in the English Channel.
“This was the first American shot fired
on the high seas after the declaration of
war,” read a historical article held by Clat-
sop Post 12 American Legion in Astoria.
“Able Seaman Goodwin and gun crew
did this with one shot.”
Stergios Emanuel Phillipakis, a former
co-owner of the Andrew & Steve’s Cafe
in Astoria, was born on the Greek island
of Crete and immigrated to New York
City in 1912. By the end of 1913 he had
moved to Astoria, where he worked at the
Clatsop Mill and in local restaurants.
Phillipakis enlisted in the 9th Com-
pany of the Oregon National Guard, and a
few months after the U.S. entered World
War I was transferred into the Army’s
65th Coast Artillery Corps at Fort Stevens
and later Camp Dix in New Jersey before
leaving on the British steamer Mauretania
for Liverpool, England.
Within three weeks, he left for France
to join the 92nd Division in the Lorraine
Sector.
“On the morning of Nov. 11, 1918, we
were about 8 miles from Metz,” France,
he wrote. “We were shelling that city
when we received orders to stop — that
the Armistice had come and the war was
over.”
Ardi Chapman was in her basement
about three years ago when she came
across a box of memorabilia from her
father, William Carl Urell, a corporal in
the Army’s 157th Aero Squadron repair-
ing airplanes.
See ANNIVERSARY, Page 7A
Doughboy Monument nears completion
Restoration on pace
for February finish
By EDWARD STRATTON
The Daily Astorian
The city of Astoria had hoped to finish the resto-
ration of Uniontown’s Doughboy Monument a year
ago, long before Sunday’s 100th anniversary of the
end of World War I.
Although delayed by a truck slamming into its
eastern flank, the monument’s restoration is on pace
to finish in February.
Named Over the Top at Cantigny after the first
successful American offensive in World War I, the
monument was dedicated in 1926 in honor of Clat-
sop County veterans. Money was raised through local
subscriptions gathered by the American Legion and
an association of Uniontown businesses.
Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
See MONUMENT, Page 7A
The statue also required repairs to stabilize it atop the pedestal.