Which Portland

which portland?

Until recently, I sat on the board of my church. During a recent meeting we were discussing who would attend the denomination’s annual convention in Portland, Oregon. I jokingly (I thought) said we could all go in my van. Others, we knew, were flying up, but a road trip sounded like fun.

A couple of months later, there we were, three of us heading north on I-5 in a pounding heat wave. Since none of us were delegates, we later rewarded ourselves and took advantage of our freedom to play hooky and explore the area. Portland is one of those places I’d driven through—once steering an ancient high-profile, motor home over a frighteningly high bridge across the Willamette River—but not given much thought to otherwise.

One thing I’ve discovered, however, is that there’s no place on earth that isn’t interesting, once you spend a little time there. The first thing that caught my attention in Portland was its self-designation as the City of Roses. This surprised me because I grew up in the City of Roses, and it wasn’t Portland, Oregon; it was Richmond, Indiana, where an enterprise known as Hill’s Roses had flourished and which now boasts an American Rose Society garden in the heart of the city’s unique Glen Miller Park.

Bottom line: There are two Rose Cities that I know of and probably a few more.

As for the name Portland itself, I became curious about how many cities of the same name dotted the map after a cousin, seeing some Facebook posts that friends of mine had made, texted to invite me to stop by her house in Vermont on the way home. On the way home from Portland to San Diego? Actually, what she said was, “Are you in Maine? If you are, take a break at my house!” A little research revealed that there are actually 21 cities named Portland in the U.S., and others outside the country. Of all of them, Portland, Oregon has the largest population (600,000-plus in the city itself) with Portland, Maine, the other well-known Portland, claiming roughly 10 per cent of that.

But back to the west coast city, with only five days, most of them spent at the convention, we were able to see only a smattering of what the area had to offer: bridges, the largest independent bookstore in the world, the Columbia River Gorge, a performance of Macbeth in an unlikely venue ... Herewith, a quick glimpse.
July 8, 2015

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