Portland State Magazine Fall 2017

6 PORTLAND STATE MAGAZINE FALL 2017 P A R K B L O C K S Find a tree to know its history A CENTURY-OLD white oak in Portland’s Lents neighborhood, which survived logging, farming, and housing developments, has sparked the imagination of four Portland State history students. They included the tree, which the city has designated as Heritage Tree 27, in a geocache—a modern-day treasure hunt. Using a GPS-enabled device such as a smart phone, and the Geocaching app, anyone can navigate to a small container or cache the students have placed on or near 14 designated Heritage Trees. Each container holds a brief history of the tree and a log for geocachers to sign and date. Printable directions to the trees are also available at bit.ly/tree_geocache . A YEAR AGO, when film student Paul Newman began documenting the resettlement process of a newly placed Iraqi refugee family in Portland, he had no idea of the impact current events would have on the project. A new president, a Middle Eastern travel ban, and a fatal, hate-fueled stabbing on a local MAX train, have made this family’s integration traumatic. Newman, the inaugural winner of the $10,000 Andries Deinum Prize for Visionaries and Provocateurs in PSU’s College of the Arts, will hold an advance screening of his film, Unstated , on Oct. 12 at this year’s Portland State of Mind (see schedule on pages 18-19). Film captures unsettled resettlement