NW Front Avenue near Centennial Mills, 1974.
City of Portland Archives, Oregon, NW Front Ave, A2012-005, 1974
NW Front Avenue, 1974
Category Archives: Front Avenue
NW Front Avenue, 1966
NW Front Avenue near NW St. Helens Road, 1966.
City of Portland Archives, Oregon, NW Front Ave near NW St. Helens Rd (CU 31-66), A2011-013, 1966.
NW Front Avenue, 1974
NW Front Avenue with Standard Steel and Western Warehouse in the background, 1974.
City of Portland Archives, Oregon, NW Front Avenue with Standard Steel and Western Warehouse in the background, A2012-005, 1974.
NW Front Avenue, 1974
Albers Shipping Office on NW Front Avenue, 1974.
City of Portland Archives, Oregon, NW Front Avenue and Albers Shipping Office, A2012-005, 1974
Front Avenue, 1939
In 1941, the Oregon Art Project of the Works Project Administration wrote Portland’s Commissioner of Public Works and proposed that this photo of Portland’s Front Avenue be the basis of a painting for his office. The photo was taken two years earlier by Minor White (1908-1976), then employed as “creative photographer” for Oregon’s Federal Art Project, looking south from the Burnside Bridge. The painting apparently was not made before the WPA closed down, so White’s photograph preserved a view that was soon lost when the buildings were demolished and Harbor Drive opened. White went on to a distinguished career in photography, teaching, and writing. He and others included this iconic view in later retrospectives of his work, but its presence at PARC reminds us of its New Deal origins.
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Our guest contributor, Dr. Kenneth Hawkins, compiled the first archival inventory of Minor White’s WPA negatives at the Oregon Historical Society in 1979, before moving (as did White) from Portland to Rochester, New York, to pursue photography and studies. He joined the National Archives in 1993. Recently he has updated the inventory and mapped it to White materials in other repositories, now including PARC.
City of Portland Archives, Oregon, A2001-008.202
Front Avenue, circa 1852
This image of Front Avenue comes from the book Portland – Its History and Builders Vol.1 by Joseph Gaston. The men in the image include W.S. Ogden, John Breek, Henry Corbett, Thomas Dryer, W.H. Barnhart, Adolph Miller, and Charles Bacon. Circa 1852.
City of Portland Archives, Oregon, A2004-002.7736
Barde Dock, 1927
In this photograph of the Barde Dock, you see a crane used during the construction of the Front Avenue sewer (this project brought us the Harbor Wall). This image is looking north. Several businesses, including the Zidell-Steinberg Company, Butzer’s Seed Store, and W. P. Fuller & Company, are visible in the background.
Front Ave Sewer Barde Dock showing the crane used in the construction, May 17, 1927 : A1999-004.245
