The Mission Theater (1624 NW Glisan St., Portland) has a long and storied past, from churchgoers to longshoremen, from actors to beer-drinking film buffs.
Built in 1912 (and today listed on the National Register of Historic Places) as the Swedish Evangelical Mission Covenant Church of Portland, it served the faith-based community in this building for 42 years.
Bring in the dockworkers! – that’s right, dockworkers. From pious church-going beginnings to serving the burly, blue-collar, longshoremen of the waterfront in one fell swoop. It must have been quite the 180-degree change. Those fellas stuck around for 28 years and then sailed on.
After a four- or five-year stint as a storage warehouse, the Mission building became home to a local acting troupe in 1986 or ’87, called Heart Theater. Sadly, their efforts lasted just about a year.
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Note: Local artist and beloved McMenamins contributor Joe Cotter passed away on Saturday, March 31, 2012. This is the first post in honor of his lovely, magical artwork that can be found throughout McMenamins’ establishments. We have lost a friend and one of the color masters of the company. Cheers, Joe.
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Joe Cotter has long been at the fore of artistic pursuits in Oregon. And it’s been McMenamins’ good fortune that, for several decades, Joe and his wife, Kolieha Bush – also an artist of remarkable talents – have done exceptional pieces throughout the McMenamins’ Kingdom. This mesmerizing painting by Joe celebrates the Oregon Country Fair, which rises every year outside of Eugene, in the rural town of Veneta.
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One hundred years ago, a special train traveled east from Portland, filled with passengers of remarkably diverse backgrounds, all bound for the same destination: the poor farm. They had been “rescued” from conditions deemed deplorable at Multnomah County’s original poor farm, located where the Oregon Zoo is today. Now they were being placed in the just-completed, comparably plush accommodations of the county’s new facility in Troutdale, accommodations that were in fact a far cry better than what could be found in most homes elsewhere in Troutdale at that time.
That’s how the first residents of McMenamins Edgefield arrived in 1911. As mothers have warned us over the years, though, there were many ways one could end up at the poor farm.
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It’s no big secret that some of our joints are thought to be haunted. The White Eagle Saloon & Rock ‘n’ Roll Hotel, for example, has long been included on lists of Portland’s most haunted spots, while Edgefield in Troutdale, Ore., even made it onto a national list of “Top Ten Most Haunted Hotels”!
McMenamins artist Lyle Hehn’s sweet depiction of Olevia Ireland’s Dancing Academy features fun characters from Hotel Oregon’s past as well as that of the Crystal Ballroom, since the delightful Miss Ireland graced both places over her career.
Miss Olevia Ireland arrived in Portland around 1909 and first worked as an actress. By 1913, she had given up the theater, taking a position as a dance instructor at Montrose Ringler’s Dreamland Academy (located at SW 2nd and Morrison). Miss Ireland and fellow Dreamland instructor, Norman Whiting, gave exhibition dances together as partners on various stages around the city. Ireland and Whiting were among those who introduced to Portland the Tango, Hesitation Waltz and One-Step.
Maxine Brooks Telephone Interview
February 24 and March 8, 1999
Maxine Brooks was born around 1912. In 1923, when she was about 11, Maxine started taking ballet lessons at the Hotel Elberton [now McMenamins Hotel Oregon] in McMinnville…
Read MoreIn the early 1970s, the reunion at Centralia of two talented friends fueled a wellspring of creative energy that resulted in intimate, unapologetic portrayals of two infamous Centralia subjects steeped in secrecy and intrigue– the 1919 Armistice Day Tragedy and the Olympic Club.
Read MoreRoom 301 honors Joseph E. Penney, an iconic figure of early-day Portland, whose lifetime of peaks and valleys was the stuff of legend – so much so, Edgefield Distillery named a fine American Dry Gin after him…..
Read MoreWelcome to the cyber catacombs of McMenamins history. It’s a wondrous, multi-layered and lyrical realm brimming with life, from the day-to-day to the extraordinary.
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