This nice bird’s-eye illustration of North Portland was put out by the North Portland Commercial Club in 1919. It appears to be promoting North Portland’s commercial and industrial potential and its access to various forms of transportation, i.e., rail, highway, streetcar, shipping channels, etc.
(City of Portland Archives)
Tags: Coast Culvert Co., Durable Roofing Co., Hamburg SS Docks, Historic Map, Kenton, Monarch Lumber Co., Nicolai Door Co., Oregon, Pacific Tank & Pipe Co., PC Safe & Vault Co., Peninsula Lumber Co., Portland, Portland Glazed Cement Pipe Co., St. Johns, Union Meat Co. Union Stock Yards, US Cashier Co.
March 2, 2012 at 7:25 am
I can see my house from here!
March 2, 2012 at 8:46 am
So the U of P was once Columbia University?
March 2, 2012 at 9:18 am
Nice map but I don’t think sailing ships are going to be traveling down the Columbia River Slough. (Google maps: http://g.co/maps/3kpzf )
March 2, 2012 at 9:19 am
Even back then, light rail was part of the CRC plan…
March 2, 2012 at 9:21 am
Yes. It was originally a Methodist university, but it failed, and the location was purchased by the Catholic church.
March 2, 2012 at 9:24 am
The Methodist university was called Portland University, and when it re-opened as a Catholic university, it was renamed Columbia University. The named change to University of Portland in the 30s.
March 2, 2012 at 1:56 pm
Neat! Lots of neat maps floating around the internet. Found this one today:
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/portland_or_1917.jpg
Sheldon
March 2, 2012 at 6:03 pm
So “Patton Ave.” is now Interstate Ave, I’m presuming. Looks like there a bridge over the Portland Channel that was removed when I-5 went in?
March 2, 2012 at 6:10 pm
Hmmm what is this Hillside Drive?
March 3, 2012 at 8:44 am
The curved block on the northeast corner of Greeley and Killingsworth makes sense now! There used to be a trolley line passing through.
March 3, 2012 at 8:54 pm
@Aaron, that curve has recently been rebuilt to remove the right-turn bypass lane.
There’s a similar curve on the SW corner of Greeley and Lombard where the trolley turned again.
March 5, 2012 at 5:57 am
champs794 in 1911, the transit share for all trips in the United states, was over 90%, because it was easier than caring for and using a horse. And horses had become a major pollution problem. So it made sense to have rail on the bridge.
Today the all trips market share for transit, is under 2%
March 5, 2012 at 7:55 am
Tad, Hillside Drive (on the map Sheldon Perry linked to) is now Terwilliger Blvd. It was built as a scenic drive, but it became the main road out of town to Salem until Barbur was built on the right-of-way of the old Southern Pacific rail line.
March 5, 2012 at 2:04 pm
I was curious about which trolley line this was, turning from Killingsworth to what is now Greeley.
On the Portland Vintage Trolleys site, I only see the Saint John’s line as a possibility, and that site also reports that as of 1918, this line was using the “Greeley Cutoff” and *not* making the turn from Killingsworth, though you’d guess it would still need to get to the carbarns. http://myplace.frontier.com/~trolley503/SJLine.html
The cutoff from Greeley to Interstate/Patton isn’t even pictured. I don’t know when that was put in, but it is a pretty serious shortcut to North Portland to leave out.
Some possibilities:
– I have stared and stared, but I don’t actually see the 1919 date on this map. Could it be slightly earlier?
– There is a the small chance that the PVT website could be imperfect
– In the time it takes to survey, draw and publish a map, you can move a trolley line
March 5, 2012 at 3:10 pm
Answering my own question, Dan H (that is another Dan, right?) says the Greeley cutoff was built in 1925. http://www.flickr.com/photos/47911905@N00/2544312034/in/photostream/
Also there is a “Portland Railway Light & Power Co. Track System” map in John T. Labbe’s, “Fares Please” dated 1918 with a note that it was last updated 1922. The cutoff isn’t included.
So at the very least, the Portland Vintage Trolley site has the date wrong, but I don’t have an authoritative source for the correct one yet.
March 5, 2012 at 6:07 pm
About the dates, there is on that site (first link from caleb tr above) under the description of the 1924 map, a note that the Greely cutoff was added in 1926: http://myplace.frontier.com/~trolley503/HistMaps.html
As for the date of this map, Patton was changed to Interstate in December 1916 so I do wonder if it isn’t a few years off.
March 6, 2012 at 1:04 pm
Per Portlandmaps, the curved building at Greeley and Killingsworth was built in 1927. Also it seems that a line ran on Killingsworth as well as Greeley. Not sure what line that would be though….