Tomorrow evening is part one of a two-part conversation series I’m co-moderating with Portland Monthly‘s Eden Dawn at the Portland Art Museum. It’s part of the programming set up to give a local context to their current major exhibition Italian Style: Fashion Since 1945 (on view through May 3). For Part I: A Look Back, […]
History
Posted inArchitecture
Inside the Under-Construction Pine Street Market
You’ve probably heard of a major development for downtown’s food scene that’s aiming for a November launch: The Pine Street Market project is reviving the historic Carriage and Baggage Building at the corner of SW 2nd and Pine. Originally built in 1886 as a parking lot for horses and carriages, it soon after became storage […]
Posted inCrafty
Calling All Oregon History Diorama-Makers! Your Time Has Come!
It’s that time again: DIORAMA TIME, the one time of the year you can relive what was arguably (according to me) the best part of elementary school—making a slapdash dollhouse, for education! After two years of hosting its Oregon history-themed diorama competition, the good people of Kick Ass Oregon History show no signs of stopping […]
Posted inPortland
Here’s What Four Decades of Gentrification in North and Northeast Portland Looks Like
In this week’s Hall Monitor, I wrote about the first of four scheduled community forums meant to help city officials spend an extra $20 million on affordable housing in the Interstate Urban Renewal Area—a snaking swath of land (born in 2000) that’s done, by some measures, more harm than good to Portland’s traditional African American […]
Posted inPortland
Cargo’s New Digs
Longtime Portland import-retailer Cargo (which also has an adorable mini-me in Astoria) began on Portland’s eastside before becoming one of the early adopters of the Pearl District 16 years ago. With their lease coming up, partners Patty Merrill and Bridgid Blackburn took advantage of the window to make a change, and set their sights back […]
Posted inBooks
In His Final Book, Harvey Pekar Explains Israel to You
When Harvey Pekar died in 2010, he left behind a book-length collaboration with illustrator JT Waldman called Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me. Israel, which was in process at the time of Pekar’s death, is a rarity in Pekar’s body of work, which is mostly interested in anecdotes and the quotidian details of his […]
Posted inHistory
Attn Local History Buffs: Tonight at PICA, A Pictorial History of Oregon: Glass Lantern Slides from the Oregon Historical Society
There’s a great-sounding program scheduled tonight at PICA, as part of Oregon Historical Society archivist Matthew Cowan’s Resouce Room residency there: A Pictorial History of Oregon is a “history of the great state of Oregon told through images that span from James Cook’s early 1778 coastal forays to the construction of the St. Johns Bridge […]
Posted inTV
Time Team America‘s New Season Debuts on OPB Tonight
Like anyone with other options, I like to think I’m pretty selective about TV, partly because programming on channels I used to love (Animal Planet, the History Channel) has been crowded out by reality dreck that seems like it’s more about dissuading people from the very interests they ostensibly cater to. (“Oh, you like animals? […]
Posted inHistory
Glenn Beck Says President Obama Is Just About Ready to Put Conservatives in Concentration Camps Any Day Now
Jesus fucking Christ, I wish Obama would just hurry up already. (Via Right Wing Watch.)
Posted in$$$
The Cost of Living in 1938
Keep in mind these numbers when looking at the cost of living in 1938: Tuition at Harvard is now $38,891, a 2014 Prius is about $25,000, the median price for a single-family home is around $200,000, and per capita income is just below $30,000… 1938 Cost of Living pic.twitter.com/0oRcpmyNQi— History In Pictures (@HistoryInPics) May 1, […]
Posted inBooks
Oregon Wants to Kill You, and Other Lessons from Peter Stark’s Astoria
As any kid who tooled around on an Apple IIe knows, getting to Oregon used to be highly awful. Starvation, cholera, and (of course) dysentery turned a whole lot of pioneers into dead pioneers, and given the harsh conditions of both overland and sea travel, one wonders why British and American settlers ever bothered with […]
Posted inFashion
Emilio Pucci, Reed College, and Italian Style: Fashion Since 1945
Back in December it was announced that the Portland Art Museum is gearing up for a major fashion exhibit, Italian Style: Fashion Since 1945, in February of 2015. Which is so. frickin’. far. away. In the meantime, Reed College’s Reed Magazine has published an article outlining the biography of one of the exhibits’ featured designers, […]