Black History
FROM THE
ARCHIVES
L OST N EIGHBORHOODS
v
Williams
continued from page
and banking industries, left Port-
land’s
Black
community
segregated, ghettoized and, final-
ly, scattered.
And the same thing happened all
over the country.
“In cities across the nation,
urban power brokers, with the
help of the federal government,
eagerly engaged in central-city
revitalization after World War II,”
na, so there was very little differ-
ence other than geographic
difference,” said early civil rights
leader Otto Rutherford, in 1978.
Gibson says her historical
research uncovered a memo
penned by a PDC official reassur-
ing the federal Housing and Urban
Development department about
racial concerns in tearing out the
homes and businesses for
“Oregon was a Klan state—it was as
prejudiced as South Carolina”
—Karen J Gibson, “Bleeding Albina”
Gibson wrote in “Bleeding Albi-
na.”
“Luxury
apartments,
convention centers, sports arenas,
hospitals, universities, and free-
ways were the land uses that
reclaimed space occupied by rela-
tively powerless residents in
central cities, whether in immi-
grant White ethnic, Black, or skid
row neighborhoods.”
The study includes quotes from
oral histories gathered decades
earlier about the region’s history.
“Oregon was a Klan state—it
was as prejudiced as South Caroli-
Emanuel Hospital expansion in
the early 70s.
“The whole transition has been
racial,” Gibson told The Skanner
News this week. “People paid
taxes in Albina – what did they get
for their taxes?”
In 1956 area banks could legally
deny loans to any Black customer
who applied, making the NAACP
Credit Union — one of North
Williams’ lost storefronts – a par-
ticularly poignant marker.
“Race was used, and the stagna-
tion and redlining was racially
based,” Gibson said.
“The whole thing has to do with
race, and it has to do with real
estate.
“White privilege means some-
thing – it means a difference in
wealth and the fact that you could
just come in and take over the
boulevard,” Gibson said.
Housing Destroyed Despite
Promises
When the PDC, city of Portland
officials and the federal Model
Cities program rolled out the
endgame on tearing down Albina
homes and businesses for
Emanuel’s expansion in 1971,
many local residents did not real-
ize the plans had been laid years
before, according to “History of
Portland’s African American
Community.”
The Emanuel Displaced Per-
son’s Association was founded by
Mrs. Leo Warren in 1970 after
locals “were abruptly confronted
with the expansion plans.” The
city required residents to move
out within 90 days, offering
homeowners a maximum $15,000
payment and renters a maximum
$4,000.
A much-hyped agreement
North Williams cuppola building, 1975
See WILLIAMS on page 15
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February 22, 2012 The Portland and Seattle Skanner v BLACK HISTORY EDITION v Page 13