Author: Slabtown Tours

Slabtown Fun Fact #17: Petition to Shut Besaw’s Saloon

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts ,
There is a saloon pictured. The men pee right at the bar-there is a grill along its length. Many of these men have mustaches. Text" "The Oak Besaw & Linklater Props. Cor. 23rd And Savier St Portland ORE.

Wait who is trying to shut down Besaw’s?  Petition to Shut Besaw’s Saloon!

Yes 3,144 Portlander’s signed a petition to close Besaw’s in May 1905.  Voters wanted all bars closed that were near the 1905 Fair Grounds.  It was this movement that led to prohibition.  This fun fact was more relevant when there was a fight to save the building.

 

Besaws c. 1938 Note the second level & tower was still intact- well now sadly the entire building is gone.
My favorite detail about this image is the drain along the bar so you never need to leave your drink alone to empty your bladder.

 

 

1880  According to Portland Maps the building on the northwest corner of N.W. 23rd Ave. and Savier St. was built.

1903 Besaw/ The Oaks (Saloon) 755 North Savier  (this is now part of Tavern and Pool northeast corner of N.W. 23rd Ave. and Savier St.

1904 –  Besaw & Liberty (George Besaw Jr. and Patrick Liberty) 761 Savier (saloon)

1905 – Besaw & Liberty (George Besaw Jr. and Patrick Liberty) 761 Savier (saloon) 765 Savier (restaurant)

1906-9  Besaw & Liberty (George Besaw Jr. and Patrick Liberty) 761 (saloon) Savier    761.5 (restaurant)

1910 Besaw & Liberty 761 Savier

1911-15 Besaw & Liberty (George D. Besaw & Medrick Liberty) 761 Savier (alteration permit in 1912)

1916 –closed/vacant

1917-18 – Besaw & Liberty Soft Drinks 761 Savier

…

1921-22 – Besaws (Confectionary)

1925-1930 – Solo Club Restaurant

1931-1933 – George Besaw Jr. Restaurant

1932 – Building permit for a card room approved

  1. 1967-1972 Besaw’s Restaurant 2301 NW Savier St. Clyde Besaw

1973- 1987 Vacant

1988-May 2015  Besaw’s Café 2301 Savier

Jan. 2016 Besaw’s restaurant managed by Cana Flug reopens at NW 21st and Raleigh

Jan. 2017 CE John demolishes historic structure at NW23rd and Savier

 

National Impacting Events

Lewis & Clark Centennial 1905

Oregon Prohibition Period 1914 -1933

National Prohibition 1919-1933

Great Depression 1929

Polk Research

1901-02 none white or restaurants or saloons

1903-  Saloon  Besaw George 755 Savier

1904- Besaw & Liberty 761 Savier saloon

George Besaw and Patrick Liberty

1905 Besaw & Liberty 761 Savior saloon

Besaw and Liberty rest. 765 Savier saloon 761 Savier

1906 Besaw George (Besaw & Liberty) re. 761.5 Savier

Besaw & Liberty (saloon 761)

1907-08 saloon Besaw & Liberty 761 Savier (no rest)

1909 Besaw George (Besaw & Liberty) rest 761.5 Savier

Besaw and liberty saloon 761 Savier

1910 – none rs. None rest. Saloon Besaw & Liberty 761 Savier

1911 –Besaw George D b. 761.5 Savier

Besaw Geo E (Besaw & Liberty) h. 761.5 Savier

Besaw & Liberty (Geo E Bewsaw Medrick Liberty saloon 761 Savier

1912-Besaw & Liberty 761 Savier

1913- Besaw Geo lab b 366 21st N

Besaw Geo D (Besaw & Liberty) h 366 21st N

Besaw & Liberty (Geo D Besaw Medrick Liberty) saloon 761 savier

1914 Besaw Geo D (Emma) (Besaw & Liberty) h. 366 21st N

Besaw & Liberty (Geo D. Besaw Merdrick Liberty) Saloon 761 Savier

Liberty, Medrick (Olive) h 815 Savier

1915 – Bewsaw Geo D (Emma F) (Besaw & Liberty) h. 366 22nd N

Besaw & Liberty saloon 761 Savier

[Oregon Prohibition starts 4 years earlier than national both last until 1933]

1916 – Besaw Geo D (Emma F) h 366 21st n

No Saloon

No Rest

No Soft Drink

1917

No Saloon

No Rest

Besaw & Liberty Soft Drinks 761 Savier

Besaw still at 366 21st n

1918

Besaw & Liberty Soft Drinks 761 Savier (366 N 21st)

1919 (no directory that year)

1920 –No listing soft drinks

Liberty Merdrick (Olive) carmn h 815 Savier

1921-22

no rest

no soft drink

Besaw Geo (Emma) conf 761 Savior Home 366 21st N

(Stands for Confectioners-Retail)

1923

Besaw Geo soft drinks 761 Savior

1924

Besaw Geo (Emma) soft drinks 761 Savier h 366 21st n

(Liberty Medrick wife Olive lives at 732 Thurman)

1925

Besaw-Geo (Emma- Solo Club Restr ) h 366 21st n

Liberty Medrick (Olive) 732 Thurman

Solo Club Restaurant 761 Savier

1926

No Besaw

Solo Club Restaurant 761 Savier

1927

Solo Club Restaurant 761 Savier

Besaw Clyde C r 366 21st N

-Geo (Emma F) Solo Club Restr h 366 21st N

1928

Besaw Clyde C. opr E E Daily r366 21st n

Geo D (Emma F.; Solo Club Restr) h 366 21st N

Solo Club Rest 761 Savier

1929

Besaw Clyde C opr EE Daily r 366 [31] N

Geo D (Emma S) (Solo Club Restr) h 366 21st n

Solo Club Restaurant 761 Savier

1930

Besaw Clyde C serviceman EE Daily r 366 N 21st

Besaw Geo (Emma) Solo Club h. 366 21st

No Solo Club in rest

1931

Besaw Geo (Emma) restr 761 Savier h 366 21st n

Besaw Geo 761 Savier {under Restaurants}

1932

Besaw Geo (Emma) rest 761 Savier h 366 21st n

1933

Besaw Clyde C (June) cook

Geo D (Emma) restr 761 Savier h 366 21st n

Besaw 761 Savier

1934

1966

no directory published

1971

Besaw Clyde (Irene) (Besaw’s Restaurant) SW 6790 Canby

Besaw’s Restaurant 2301 NW Savier St.

1972

Besaw’s Restaurant 2301 NW Savier St.

Owned by Clyde and Mrs. Irene Besaw

1973

Chester Besaw mech Columbia Body & Equip h 1715 NW 23rd Ave

No other Besaw last names in phonebook

No rest listing

1974

no Besaw

1975

(reverse directory) 2301 Vacant

1979

(reverse directory) 2301 Vacant

1983

No rest. Besaw

1984

Library does not have

1985

No last names Besaw

No rest.

1987

(reverse directory) 2301 NW Savior St. No Return

1988 library does not have

1989

Besaw’s Café [& Beesaw’s Café]2301 Savier

Slabtown Fun Fact #16: Can you name all five historic names for this former Thurman Street movie theater?

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts ,
Image of theater. The building is a one-story brick structure. The front facade has an attractive set of three rounded windows framed by a rounded roof line. The side facade had a few windows and a fading ghost sign text "Ideal Theater"

Can you name all five historic names for this former Thurman Street movie theater?

The Ideal Theater Building 2405 NW Thurman. (TLM April 2015)
How Many Names Did This Theater have while operating as a theater? Answer is: FIVE names.

Test your skill…

1912: Ideal Theater was Designed by Emil Schacht and Son (silent movie theater)
owner: Conrad LeBlanc
1927: The Senate (facade remodel)
1929: The Bluebird
1944(45): Elmo (Fire c. 1949)
1951: The Crown
Closed December 1953 was used as a warehouse for years.

Emil Schacht practiced architecture in Oregon for decades and is attributed for introducing the residential English Arts & Crafts style to Portland (Ritz p. 347). His fifteen residential buildings in Willamette Heights neighborhood (1905-1909) are worthy of a Multiple Properties National Register Nomination. The advocates fort the Irvington Historic District have documented and preserved many of his notable residences. He designed Astoria City Hall in 1904 which is still standing and had been adaptively reused as a hotel. The Lewis and Clark Exposition Building (1905) was one of his more famous designs. My person favorite building for its cultural significance to Portland’s Black History and pleasing design is the Golden West Hotel.

The architectural firm Emil Schacht and Son lasted from 1910-1916.

Letter Preserved at the Portland City Archives and Records Office
Every secondary source states that the theater had 300 seats. This document leads me to believe there were four hundred in the peek period of significance.

All historic sources state the theater seated between 300-330 patrons looking at the letter below I’m inclined to think that the theater in the WWII years seated 400 plus. Glad that James Lommasson and Stewart Harvey remodeled this building in 2004. I am often distracted by articles around Portland, OR and censorship in the late teens. Oddly enough in 1920 C.E. Yeager proprietor of the Ideal Theater was fined for having a girl under the age of 18 working in his theater-it must have been a sting because six theater owners were charged.

 

Slabtown Fun Fact #15 Ramp to Nowhere off of Fremont Bridge. Where should it go?

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts , , ,
Slabtown Fun Fact #15 Ramp to Nowhere off of Fremont Bridge. Where should it go?
The freeway “chad”/ghost ramp is just north of St. Patrick’s Church.
This was once going to connect the Fremont Bridge to I505. (Image TLM March 2015)

 

PDC Slide City of Portland Archives I-505 Vision Couch School was still sharing space with MLC at the time this image was created.

Neighbors were alarmed when they noticed surveyors planning to clear away homes along the proposed route for I-505. The initial environment impact statement was four pages.  In November 13, 1970, the Oregonian reported in “Road Route Plan Aired” that J.H. Versed construction engineer for the State Highway Department’s metropolitan division estimated that the construction would start in 1973 after homes along Thurman and Vaughn Street could be acquired and demolished.  He estimated that the interstate would be completed in 1976.  A few months later in September 1971 neighborhood groups filed a class action suit seeking to prevent further acquisition of right-of-way for I-505 and I-405 that were displacing residents.

 

Road Map assumed I-505 a 3.17 spur was going to be built. The section is from a Portland City map above was published in 1979 by Gousha. 

Memories of Portland Development Commission’s(1) proposed Vaughn Street Urban Renewal plan were still in the recent past I-405 and I-505 would eliminate the blight that Housing Authority of Portland(2)  and others had failed to eliminate.  Thurman Street homes were being purchased to facilitate clearing a path for the 1.44-mile Portland spur.  The city planning staff estimated that 400 people and some 200 of units of housing would be impacted by the I-505 alone. Our Historic Slabtown Tour would not be possible today had this freeway been built because what little that would be left to view would be so close to a freeway that the car noise would cancel out my tour guide vocal cords. The I-505 was conceived of as a junction was conceived to run between St. Helens Road (Highway 30) to Interstate 405.  Puzzlingly one of the adverse impacts cited in the blocking of the construction of this interstate was that it would trigger an increase in land values.

If you want to learn more about the fight to stop the I-505 I recommend reading Chet Orloff’s 1991 interview with narrator Morton Paglin (link).

(1) PDC now known as Prosper Portland

(2) HAP now know as Home Forward

Fun Fact #14 Where did Slabtown Kids Learn to Swim?

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts , ,
Image of the pool in the basement of MLC School. The water has been drained out but the lane dividers are still attached hanging like party decorations. Part of a mural of seas creature is on the right. This is taken from the deep end of the dry pool where there was once a diving board.

Fun Fact #14 Where did Slabtown Kids Learn to Swim?

New Couch School Pool PPS Files at MLC

Answer at School. In 1914 Portland Public Schools District was making every effort to replace Portland’s wooden school structures with new fire proof school buildings.  The Old Couch School (built in 1882) was at 17th and Kerny and had a dire reputation post Small Pox (Think COVID-19 this was even prior to the Spanish Influenza).  The New Couch School in 1914, at NW 20th and Glisan was one of the early efforts to replace a wooden structure. The excavated this property went deep enough to provide for a basement swimming pool at the time they called it a swim tank.

Empty Pool 2012 TLM
There was not really a shallow end tables we dropped into the water so that non-swimmers could learn to swim (2012 TLM)

Fun Fact #13 Thanksgiving Trivia!

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts

According to the Oregonian article dated November 25, 1917, the state of Oregon wasn’t always in agreement with the rest of country as to when Thanksgiving should be celebrated. The newspaper reported that in 1894, then Governor Sylvester Pennoyer wrote a handwritten proclamation on an ordinary sheet of note paper from his Salem office. It read: “I hereby appoint the last Thursday of this month a Thanksgiving holiday.” This caused confusion because 1894 had five Thursdays in November, and the rest of the nation was observing the holiday on the fourth as it is today.  The article claimed some Oregonian’s celebrated one day and some of them observed the other.  Even back then, they must have been thinking about how many shopping days we could get in before Christmas.

 

Governor Sylvester Pennoyer agrees Walking  Tours Gift Certificates make great stocking stuffers. Order Online.

 

Fun Facts #12 Would Jesus have shopped here?

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts , ,
He may not have been a regular customer, but many shoppers were very “faithful”
to this 23rd Avenue business.
Image Credit Mike Ryerson

Would Jesus have shopped here?

When Jon Heil opened his Better Beef & Bible store in the summer of 1976, rents for prime retail spaces on the not-yet-Trendy-Third Avenue were still very inexpensive. The sharp young marketing graduate took a chance and opened a small shop in the former Arrow Ambulance office at the corner of NW 23rd & Hoyt Street to specialized in what he loved best. Good quality beef,and the good book.Heil, who was a Christian, had been a sales-man for Attilla Meat Company, so he knew his merchandise well.  His unique business served the neighborhood until the early 1980s . . . mostly with beef.

Slabtown Fun Facts #11: Myrtle Casper

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Slabtown Fun Facts #11: Myrtle Casper
Image courtesy Mike Ryerson
Photographer Fred DeWolfe

The late Myrtle Casper was a longtime resident of the Slabtown area in Northwest Portland. Her husband Ben Casper owned the Saw Shopwhere the Northwest Portland Library parking lot is located today. Myrtle loved spending her time shooting pool with the guys at the Northwest(now McMenamins) Tavern & Pool on NW 23rd Avenue. After all, what else was there for a lady todo when her husband sharpened saws all day? Myrtle Clara Casper was born in Kansas in 1890.She was married three times, and she spent many of her early years doing housekeeping. She died in 1974 in an apartment above her favorite pool hall at age 83. Ben died four years later at 93 years old.A large copy of this photograph of Myrtle hangs on the wall of McMenamins Tavern & Pool.

Fun Fact #10 Who was that big guy in the center?

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts , , ,
Fun Fact #10 Who was that big guy in the center?
Who was that big guy in the center?
He towered above his Lincoln High teammates, and
he let them to a State Basketball Championship.

Slabtown had a hometown hero, because of his own struggles with class and the status quo in Portland. His “quest” and notoriety (transformation from freaky tall to starlight), which was followed by residents even after they were relocated, was to succeed at a sport—basketball—with which he had had no previous experience. Harvey Wade “Swede” Halbrook, who had an important career in the National Basketball Association in the 1950s. I met pro-baseball player Milo Meskel’s sister for the first time at the third Guild’s Lake Courts reunion in 2009.

Beverly Meskel: We all had fun down there. Everybody was friends—didn’t matter where you came from, you were all broke. We didn’t have anywhere to go…. We came from Minnesota where my dad made a dollar a day. If we didn’t live on a farm, we all would have starved to death…. Swede Halbrook, well, if you lived in Guild’s Lake [Courts], everyone knew Swede Halbrook.  Well, in the fifth grade I stood about this high [motioning short] and Swede stood about this high [motioning tall]. And my brother-in-law’s dad used to say you two should get married so your kids would be the right size. He was quite a guy. I think there were…four guys [brothers]—Joe, Dan, and Jim and him, I think.

Joe: They were all tall.

Beverly Meskel: They were all tall, but Swede also had a gland problem. We almost lost him in sixth grade; he was up at Oregon Health Science for a long time.

Joe: Halbrook was in my class at Chapman.

Beverly Meskel: Was he? So, like I said, he was not that well of a person. Plus he tried so much to have friends that he did not know who his friends were and who were the users. He got himself in quite a bit of trouble… He was a neat kid, really.

Swede Holbrook at Guilds Lake Courts Courtesy Guilds Lake History Project

Swede, pictured sitting down with his long legs and enormous shoes, became a man of mythical proportions, who, at 7’3”, was the tallest player ever to play for Oregon State College. He was even larger than life when he lived at Guild’s Lake Courts, but he never played basketball there because there was only one hoop in the entire development, and that was inside a mixed-use room in the Guild’s Lake School.

Fun Fact #7 Lost Flanders Street Home Found Thanks to Local History Detective Mike Ryerson

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts ,
Fun Fact #7 Lost Flanders Street Home Found Thanks to Local History Detective Mike Ryerson

Sladen House Courtesy Sladen Family & Mike’s History Tours (our old branding)

Portland’s layers of street re-naming and re-numbering can some times cause a house to get lost.  The Flanders Street home was found thanks to Local History Detective Slabtown team member Mike Ryerson.

When Civil War army veteran Captain Joseph A. Sladen retired from the military in the early 1890s, he built a beautiful home for his large family on Flanders Street.  This structure is one of the last remaining 1890s mansions in the boundaries of the Alphabet Historic District.  

Captain Sladen courtesy Mike Ryerson

After Sladen died in 1911,  his family eventually moved to various locations, many of his descendants live in the east coast region of the country. When his descendants attempted to find the historic old house based on the address obtained on multiple sources including: historic letters, Polk directories and federal census enumerations, they determined that their assessorial home had been demolished. After being lost for 75 years, we’ve informed them we found it right where he’d left it.


     

 

 

 

We are always digging deep into the neighborhood history to enrich our walking tours:

In 2013 after this fun fact came out became fascinated with the remodeling being done on the Captain Joseph A. Sladen Home at NW 22nd Flanders.  Mike Ryerson contacted the owners to learn more about their restoration project and what the current owner did or did not know about the history of the house. Co-owner Robert Wagner, a partner in the law firm of Miller & Wagner who occupies the building, told us the house was originally the home of Captain Sladen who had served in the Civil War. He went on to tell us that a book had been written called “Making Peace with Cochise” which was compiled from entries in Sladen’s journal during his military days. (More on the book later.) We didn’t recall ever having seen any old photos of the house, so we set out to find one. After searching historic Oregonian newspapers for facts on Captain Sladen, we posted a message on Ancestry.com asking Sladen family members if they had any photographs of the building. Within a few days, we received several replies informing us that the house had been torn down years ago. Over the course of many years, Sladen’s decentness had researched “722 Flanders Street” to see if they could find the old family house, only to conclude that the address no longer existed. We were happy to inform them that Portland addresses were changed in the 1930s and their old family home was safe and sound at 2210 NW Flanders Street. They now have current photos, and they have shared with us and the current owners many splendid images of the old Sladen house and the Sladen family.

Fun Facts #6: Its not Christmas without Elvis

Slabtown Tours Fun Facts
Fun Facts #6: Its not Christmas without Elvis

DJ Fired for Playing Presley Record

Found a free source of Elvis Presley’s 1957 version of this song-listen for yourself. I do not have the set list from Elvis’s performance to a crowd of 14,000 at the Multnomah Civic Stadium on September 2, 1957. Lots of great details about his time in Portland on a Elvis fan site including images and recorded interviews.

Portland’s KEX Radio banned Elvis Presley’s recordingof “White Christmas” from being played on the air.  One popular deejay at the radio station ignored his boss and it cost him his job.  When radio station KEX received a copy of “Elvis’ Christmas Album” in 1957, the management made the decision not to air the “White Christmas” cut.  Disc jockey Al Priddy figured station manager Mel Bailey wouldn’t be listening late on a
Sunday night, so he gave it a spin.  Unfortunately, Bailey was tuned-in and he promptly
called the station and told Priddy to finish his show and then look for a new job.  “The record was banned because it is not in the good taste we ascribe to Christmas music,” he
told the Oregonian. “Presley gives it a rhythm and blues interpretation. It doesn’t seem to me to be in keeping with the intent of the song,” he added.  Al Priddy returned to the work at the station several weeks later and all was forgotten.  In 1987, at age 78, he was invited to be a guest disc jockey at KEX so he could play Elvis’ “White Christmas” one more time.

Mike’s Fun Facts (2014-2015) were produced monthly by Mike Ryerson and Tanya Lyn March PhD partners of Mike’s History Tours.