Oregon Historical Society Brooklyn School garden Portland City Council and the Multnomah County Commission agreed to set up work projects and pay those employed on them in scrip, more than 2,500 local merchants agreed to accept the scrip in payment for goods in spite of some uncertainty whether they would be fully reimbursed. (They were.) All of these efforts were important, but Portlanders of 1933 (like those of 1893) were not content simply to rely on the goodwill of the well-off, and they were not willing to let the city's government and business elite dictate their needs. Community self-reliance was alive and well in the Rose City and it found expression in a variety of projects sponsored by social organizations, churches, ethnic associations and neighborhood groups. Self-help Response to Financial Hardship • In March, sixty volunteers from the community were working with the Portland Garden Club to develop a plan for converting unused city lots into neighborhood gardens for the unemployed. The volunteer gardeners agreed to make their own plots working models for their neighbors and to assist less experienced participants in the program. An Oregonian reporter noted that "one of the finest features of the plan is the spirit of helpfulness that is already active among the workers." • In December the Suey Sing Chamber of Labor and Commerce sponsored a celebration in conjunction with its move to new headquarters at 510 SW 2nd Avenue. The group, which had more than 250 members, operated a free employment agency and did relief work among the city's Chinese population. • The Catholic Women's League announced during May that 505 girls and women had been placed during the preceding year through the league's employment office. In addition, 489 families had been provided with relief aid. • An unusual community was flourishing in Sullivan's Gulch (near the present day Lloyd Center) in 1933. Called Shantytown, it was temporary home to several hundred depression victims who were living in self-built temporary structures. The town had its own mayor, civil servants, police force, and laws. Plans were afoot in February to erect a community building for spiritual and educational activities, and "Mayor" James W. Moran was anxious to lessen his constituents' dependence on food donations by obtaining use of some land for gardening. "Most of the men here have a trade," Moran explained. "They are victims of the depression and are not looking for charity. They much prefer to work and help themselves." • The women of the James John School Parent-Teacher Circle planned a unique entertainment benefit at the beginning of the year to raise money for the milk fund in St. Johns—so unique, in fact, that school authorities asked them to find another location for it. "We got to have money for the milk fund if the babies are to be fed," one of the women explained. "You know very well we can't raise more than ten dollars if we give a nice, quiet home talent benefit entertainment at the school- house. And you know that our husbands and the other men will pay 50 cents for a good smoker." Thus, boxers were found to entertain the men of St. Johns so that babies in the community would not go hungry. Self-help Response to the Public Market Closure Portland's Central Public Market, a thriving madhouse of small-scale commercial activity, was nationally famous. Extending along Southwest Yamhill between 3rd and 5th, the market had begun in 1914 and had been under city management almost from the beginning. It was here that future grocery tycoon Fred Meyer got his start, running a stall in company with local Chinese, Japanese and Italian truck gardeners. As early as 1926, plans were afoot to construct a new public market along Southwest Front Street. The proposed move became a very controversial issue in Portland, and when the City Council gave its final go ahead to the project in 1931, it did so in spite of opposing petitions filed by 18,000 market customers and 246 farmers. One commissioner, who had been out of town when the council ordinance was passed, questioned his colleagues' right to ignore the petitions and charged that the public interest was being betrayed in favor of a few large property holders who stood to benefit by the move. Nevertheless, the council chose to let the project proceed. Before opening the new Front Street Market building in December, 1933, the council called for removal of the sheds used at the Yamhill Market. (They were distributed to city parks to protect horseshoe players from the rain!) The idea was to force reluctant farmers to move to the new facility, but few took the hint. Some simply closed up shop and others moved off the street and into street-level stories of buildings along Yamhill. Two hundred of the former market tenants formed their own cooperative market and moved into another Yamhill location. 34 «
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