On April 30, 1939, The Oregonian ran a story on page 14: “SPORTS CLASSES FEATURED ON SPRING PARK PROGRAM: The spring program of the bureau of parks and public recreation is changing to a sports program with emphasis upon instruction in the individual sports.” This is followed by a listing of activities ranging from Tennis to Dance, with “Children’s rhythm band; Peninsula Park, Wednesday, 10 A.M.” (A band doesn’t seem to be an “individual sport,” but that’s what the paper wrote!
Early in the next year (January 5, 1940, p. 17), this appeared in the paper: 4 NEW CLASSES OFFERED FOR CHILDREN: Open to all children in the designated age groups are four new classes to be sponsored this winter by the educational committee of the American Association of University Women. Creative dancing will be taught by Mrs. Allyn Hudson to pre-school children… at the Peninsula Park community building. A rhythm band for pre-school children will be led by Miss Ruth Wolfe on Wednesday from 10 to 11:30 A.M.”
Nine years later, the program seemed to be going strong. On June 12, 1949 (p. 99) the Oregonian ran a substantial article by Marian Miller about how children could enjoy their vacation time in the city’s parks and playgrounds, including this interesting bit: “Mothers had better hide their best kettles and pans if they don’t want to loan them to the playgrounds’ rhythm band. But there’s to be a band for the big children and I can wager all the big boys and girls with talent will find out all about that.”
Children in today’s photo would probably be in their eighties today!
A lot of white kids…cute though.
A well-outfitted group of kids – I kind of laughed seeing that most of them had bumps and bruises in their knees and legs! This was a time when kids still played ACTIVELY outside, ha.
I have a fondness for Peninsula Community Center because my grandfather Herbert Heywood painted ceiling murals there as a WPA job during the Depression. You could hardly see them when I was a kid – years of oil furnace soot and dirt. They were cleaned about 15 years ago and made visible again.
If I’d been a boy child in this group, I would have been keen on girls (counting from left to right) 2 & girl 8. Girl 2 because of her great hair and girl 8 because she looks smart and she’s blonde.
Cute kids — a couple of the girls look like Shirley Temple — who was all the rage back then. The beautiful Peninsula Park Community Center building is visible in the background. That was Portland’s first in-park community center when it was built circa 1915, and it’s still a very active community center today. Thanks, Debby, for pointing out those beautiful murals!
100% adorable! And I wonder if the boy in the dark suit on the right is the conductor?
Conductor or not, I think the little boy on the right is sitting by his twin sister.
For the record, in 1940 Portland was 98% white, a little over 1% asian (which would have mostly been old Chinese men, as Chinese immigration had been banned after 1892) and less than 1% African American. So no surprise that these are white kids.
By 2010, the percentage of white population had dropped to 76%. It will be interesting to see the 2020 census, if a good count is possible.
I find the comment about the color of the kids offensive, switch out white for black and it would certainly be considered racist.
Don’t care for the comment regarding the color of the kids, they are innocent little cherubs, the color shouldn’t make any difference.
Why all the PC Police, I don’t see anything racist just a bunch of kids playing; you sound like what I use to see at Little League games where kids were having fun and the parents were creating the problems.
Hats at a rakish angle. Always a good look. Especially on cute kids.
I don’t think the initial comment was about these kids. I think it was more of an observation about who was excluded from participating in this activity. The subsequent comment about Portland’s demographics in 1939–which frankly surprised me—seems to point to a more innocent explanation.
Please remember this is a City run blog. Any comment that violates the Social Media Terms of Use will be removed. Thank you for your continued support. We hope to continue to provide content everyone can enjoy.
I want to reiterate that this is a city site and must adhere to the Social Media Terms of Use. Any comment that violates the terms of use will be removed. This includes comments that are not topically related to the post. We want this site to continue as a place to explore Portland through historical images.
Vintage Portland 
On April 30, 1939, The Oregonian ran a story on page 14: “SPORTS CLASSES FEATURED ON SPRING PARK PROGRAM: The spring program of the bureau of parks and public recreation is changing to a sports program with emphasis upon instruction in the individual sports.” This is followed by a listing of activities ranging from Tennis to Dance, with “Children’s rhythm band; Peninsula Park, Wednesday, 10 A.M.” (A band doesn’t seem to be an “individual sport,” but that’s what the paper wrote!
Early in the next year (January 5, 1940, p. 17), this appeared in the paper: 4 NEW CLASSES OFFERED FOR CHILDREN: Open to all children in the designated age groups are four new classes to be sponsored this winter by the educational committee of the American Association of University Women. Creative dancing will be taught by Mrs. Allyn Hudson to pre-school children… at the Peninsula Park community building. A rhythm band for pre-school children will be led by Miss Ruth Wolfe on Wednesday from 10 to 11:30 A.M.”
Nine years later, the program seemed to be going strong. On June 12, 1949 (p. 99) the Oregonian ran a substantial article by Marian Miller about how children could enjoy their vacation time in the city’s parks and playgrounds, including this interesting bit: “Mothers had better hide their best kettles and pans if they don’t want to loan them to the playgrounds’ rhythm band. But there’s to be a band for the big children and I can wager all the big boys and girls with talent will find out all about that.”
Children in today’s photo would probably be in their eighties today!
A lot of white kids…cute though.
A well-outfitted group of kids – I kind of laughed seeing that most of them had bumps and bruises in their knees and legs! This was a time when kids still played ACTIVELY outside, ha.
I have a fondness for Peninsula Community Center because my grandfather Herbert Heywood painted ceiling murals there as a WPA job during the Depression. You could hardly see them when I was a kid – years of oil furnace soot and dirt. They were cleaned about 15 years ago and made visible again.
If I’d been a boy child in this group, I would have been keen on girls (counting from left to right) 2 & girl 8. Girl 2 because of her great hair and girl 8 because she looks smart and she’s blonde.
Cute kids — a couple of the girls look like Shirley Temple — who was all the rage back then. The beautiful Peninsula Park Community Center building is visible in the background. That was Portland’s first in-park community center when it was built circa 1915, and it’s still a very active community center today. Thanks, Debby, for pointing out those beautiful murals!
100% adorable! And I wonder if the boy in the dark suit on the right is the conductor?
Conductor or not, I think the little boy on the right is sitting by his twin sister.
For the record, in 1940 Portland was 98% white, a little over 1% asian (which would have mostly been old Chinese men, as Chinese immigration had been banned after 1892) and less than 1% African American. So no surprise that these are white kids.
By 2010, the percentage of white population had dropped to 76%. It will be interesting to see the 2020 census, if a good count is possible.
I find the comment about the color of the kids offensive, switch out white for black and it would certainly be considered racist.
Don’t care for the comment regarding the color of the kids, they are innocent little cherubs, the color shouldn’t make any difference.
Why all the PC Police, I don’t see anything racist just a bunch of kids playing; you sound like what I use to see at Little League games where kids were having fun and the parents were creating the problems.
Hats at a rakish angle. Always a good look. Especially on cute kids.
I don’t think the initial comment was about these kids. I think it was more of an observation about who was excluded from participating in this activity. The subsequent comment about Portland’s demographics in 1939–which frankly surprised me—seems to point to a more innocent explanation.
Please remember this is a City run blog. Any comment that violates the Social Media Terms of Use will be removed. Thank you for your continued support. We hope to continue to provide content everyone can enjoy.
I want to reiterate that this is a city site and must adhere to the Social Media Terms of Use. Any comment that violates the terms of use will be removed. This includes comments that are not topically related to the post. We want this site to continue as a place to explore Portland through historical images.