Dave Knows Portland

Archives for July 2011

July 16, 1849: Oregon Territory Legislature Convenes First Session

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The Oregon Territory was created by the U.S. Congress in 1848, but the appointed governor, Joseph Lane, did not arrive at Oregon City until March the next year. And not until July 16, 1849 did the first Territorial Legislature convene.

The territorial legislature, known as the Legislative Assembly, was made a bicameral body. It consisted of a nine-member Council and an eighteen-member House of Representatives. The House could be increased in size, but could not exceed thirty members. Legislators were popularly elected and vacancies were filled by special election. Legislative sessions were limited to sixty days. The Legislative Assembly was prohibited from passing laws interfering with land claims and with passing laws which taxed non-residents at a higher rate than residents. The Legislative Assembly was also prohibited from incorporating banks and financial institutions and from acquiring debts in the name of the territory.

Issues decided in that first session included renaming Tuality County to Washington County, and Champoeg County to Marion County. Asa Lovejoy, of Portland/Boston coin flip fame, served as Speaker of the House.

Cooking With The Timbers Army: Haggis

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Timbers Army legends Abram Goldman-Armstrong and Barnacle Brian present Celtopunk Cookery:

In this short, rough video shot before Burn’s Night, Abram Goldman-Armstrong shows you how to prepare the center piece for the supper….HAGGIS!

Visit the Celtopunk Cookery – How to Make Haggis on YouTube for the full recipe!

(Believe it or not, this isn’t the first installment of Cooking With The Timbers Army – in 2008 another Timbers Army legend (and The Oregonian movie critic) Shawn Levy, cooked a whole pig – and blogged about it: Whodathunkit? I Write about Cooking a Whole Pig.)

Montavilla Street Fair (17-July-2011)

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Montavilla Street Fair 2011The 2011 Montavilla Street Fair takes place Sunday, July 17 from 10am until 5pm in Montavilla (SE 79th between Stark and Pine, and 78th between Washington and Stark).

Two stages await you:

  • The 78th Avenue Stage features performers such as Metro Arts dancers and musicians, Mama Yama, and Lew Jones. Milepost 5 will be performing scenes from their upcoming play between acts.
  • Live musical acts including Stargazie, Pork Belly Futures, and The Hill Dogs perform on the 79th Avenue Stage.

Craft and food vendors will be on hand, and the Montavilla Farmers Market will operate from 10am to 2pm during the fair.

Oh, and did I mention the beer and wine garden?! It will be set up in the lot behind the Bipartisan Cafe (7901 SE Stark).

For more details, including full music and performance schedule, visit the Montavilla East Tabor Business Association website, or the Facebook event page.

Multnomah County Library Has A Photostream

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Rose Festival Parade, 1916The Multnomah County Library maintains an impressive flickr photostream. Library branches, including Albina, Belmont, North Portland, and Troutdale, are featured in photo sets. As are scenes from library events such as the Central Library Block Party (2008, 2009, 2010). But most interesting is the History set. The Multnomah County Library, founded in 1864, is the oldest public library west of the Mississippi, and apparently has long been the subject of photographers. [Hat tip Bart King]

Rose Festival Parade, 1916 photo used under the Creative Commons Attributiong-nonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic license.

July 15, 2009: Portland Hosts Triple-A All-Star Game

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Triple-A All-Star Game 2009On July 15, 2009 Portland’s PGE Park (now Jeld-Wen Field) played host to the Triple-A All-Star Game.

The Oregonian‘s John Hunt reported:

A sellout crowd of 16,637 attended the game between the Pacific Coast League All-Stars and those from the International League — the biggest crowd for this event in 18 years. This wasn’t major league baseball, but it was big-time.

Portland-born Johnny Pesky, who became a fixture with the Boston Red Sox, was among those to throw out ceremonial pitches before Wednesday’s game.

“The setting couldn’t have been more perfect for the kind of an event that parallels the excitement of the movie, ‘The Natural,'” PCL president Branch Rickey said before the game.

The International League beat the PCL 6-5.

The game served as sort of a last hurrah for baseball at PGE Park. The 2010 Portland Beavers played one more season in Portland (with an average attendance of 4265), before the stadium was remodeled to be more amenable to soccer and football. The MLS Portland Timbers and the PSU Vikings now call Jeld-Wen Field home.