Page 4
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.
A p ril 28, 2010
photo by J ake
T homas /T he P ortland O bserver
Ed Washington talks to people participating in a historic tour managed by the Fair Housing Council of Oregon, givds a talk at the site of Vanport, a multi-ethnic commu­
nity he lived in as a child that was washed away by a flood in 1948.
Tour Looks at Oregon’s Grim History
Past discrimination revealed
J ake T homas
T he P ortland O bserver
because in 1919 the Portland
Realty Board adopted a policy
that realtors were not allowed to
show blacks housing in white
neighborhoods. Some neighbor­
hoods adopted covenants exclud­
ing blacks and Asians, while
banks and insurance companies
also adopted policies meant to
in housing in the late 1960s and
70s, Portlanders were routinely
To some, a dog park, the Ex­ denied a place to live on the basis
position Center, and PGE Park o f race, religion, or familial sta­
might seem to be fairly mundane tus.
parts o f Portland's cityscape. But
As the bus swung onto North
a historic tour sponsored by the Williams Avenue, once a com­
Fair Housing Council o f Oregon, mercial corridor in an African
a group that monitors discrim i­ American part o f town, Hess
nation in housing, takes a glimpse explained that Albina was origi­
into how these locations reveal nally populated by immigrants
the city's grim history.
from eastern and southern Eu­
Last w eek, approxam ately rope in the late 1800s, and was
two hundred people interested in later where blacks, working as
civil rights history piled into four railroad porters, put down roots
buses for a look at Portland's in the early 20th century. Even­
less-than-savory past.
tually, black residents would
Diane Hess, education direc­ m ostly occupy the A lberta,
tor at the Fair Housing Council W a v e rly
H e ig h ts,
and
o f Oregon, who served as a tour Woodlawn neighborhoods.
guide, explained that before Con­
H ess said that the reason
gress enacted landmark legisla­ African Americans became so buttress segregation. In 1959,
tion meant to end discrimination concentrated in those areas was R epublican G o vernor M ark
Hatfield signed into law a fair
housing act for the state, but it
did little to change prevailing dis­
criminatory patterns. Hess said
that occasionally her organiza­
tion still gets housing covenants
with archaic racial language.
As the bus crept up Williams,
Hess pointed to a series o f va­
cant lots that surround Emmanuel
Hospital. Each one, she, said,
, call
used to be an African American
fo r d e ta ils
home or business that was dis­
placed by the expansion o f the
by
hospital in the late 1960s and
70s, which was stalled after fed­
eral funds failed to materialize.
"We're going to the city o f
Vanport, which no longer ex­
ists," she said, as the bus ap­
proached a large dog park on the
outskirts o f north Portland.
This used to be where the
Vanport, which was relatively
integrated given the time, was washed
away in a flood in 1948. The houses,
which had wooden foundations, were
lifted up by the flood and bashed into
each other as flood waters forever
destroyed the settlement.
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location o f Vanport, a large pub­
lic housing settlement built to
accom m odate the influx o f
people looking for work in ship­
yards during the peak o f WW1I.
The shipyards also attracted
African Americans who moved
into Vanport after being excluded
elsewhere in Portland, which
prompted the Oregonian to run
the headline, "New Negro Mi­
grants W orry City."
One o f these immigrants was
Ed Washington, who arrived in
Vanport from Birmingham, Ala.
when he was 7 years old. Speak­
ing b e fo re th e cro w d th at
amassed after buses emptied,
he recalled good schools, lots of
other kids to play with, and a
house with a big yard during his
stay in the settlement.
Now a dog park, he said that
he always sees a dog doing its
business where his family's house
once stood whenever he visits.
"I always think that it's really
bad they're doing that at our
house," he said to laughter.
Vanport, which was relatively
integrated given the time, was
washed away in a flood in 1948.
The houses, which had wooden
foundations, were lifted up by
the flood and bashed into each
other as flood waters forever
destroyed the settlement. W ash­
ington knew that he wasn't com ­
ing back, and the places where
black people could relocate were
limited.
People piled back on the buses
as tour went further north to the
Portland E xposition C enter,
which hosts events ranging from
gun to cat shows. But, it too, is
part o f Oregon's uglier history.
Tensions had been present
since Japanese immigrants be­
gan moving to Oregon in search
o f agricultural work in the late
1800s, but after Pearl Harbor
was bombed in 1941 by Japan,
continued
on page 17