About the Collins View History Project

We aim to preserve and celebrate the history of our neck of the woods. We also intend to honor the nature of the land - it's waters, flora, and fauna.

We will get a product sooner if we just take what residents are willing to give us - and have independent articles on this page/site. Please send historical facts, figures, dates, photos, and/or stories about any of the items on the list below to outreach@collinsview.org

Partial stories or recollections are welcome as such.. those might stimulate others to fill in or correct facts, and so on. Tell a story!

Collins View History

• The Land
• History of the Land pre-settlers.
• History of the Land 1850-1880. Surveys? Platting? Donation Land Claims? Logging. Streets and Roads.
• Formation of Mulnomah County .. and what that may have meant for CV. (No zoning laws.)
• The name Collins View?
• Where exactly were the City Limits in 1890? A map shows the line could have run east-west at about Lobelia, south of taylor's ferry!
• Story of Annexation to city of Portland. What was the transition like?
• Were early parts of Collins View considered vacation properties? (Folklore)

---

• Businesses
• What was it like at the big intersection in the early days? Businesses we assume.
• Did you know that the Market of Choice building used to be a feed (and seed) store? It later became Burlingame Grocery.. There was a greasy spoon lunch counter across the front, inside the windows.
• The Era of a gas stations on every corners.
• Would be nice to have a map showing the development of the business district over time. Or any info / stories etc. What all was here?
• Terwilliger Center itself has had many different businesses.

---

• Did you know that Lobelia was First Avenue? Terwilliger used to be Maple. The great re-numbering and street re-naming project.
• SIDEWALKS. Not only were there undeveloped streets, there were no sidewalks... so there was a whole discussion in the 80's to get PDX bureau of planning to relax requirements for sidewalks on any new development. But still, we see expensive orphan sections of sidewalk we see around. It seems that whatever was relaxed has been re-tighted. ANYWAY, that in itself would be a good story to have correctly stated. AKA 'Case of Disappearing Sidewalk.'

See top of page for address of where to send any contributions you may have!

COLLINS VIEW TIMELINE

Here we compile the data, then generate a timeline.

• The timeline will be divided into ~15 Decades, 1870-2020.
• Each decade could begin with some 'longer events' - eg logging of RVNA in 1880's and 1950's.
• Timeline entries would be of the form: date; title; sentence(s); optional photo(s).
• Maybe the photos would be presented in a galley above or below the timeline.

— JM, Nov 2020

EARLY HISTORY
Native Americans. We want more info!!!
Part of Oregon Territory
Oregon's Provisional Government (1841-1849)
Territorial Government (1849-1859)
Statehood, Feb 14, 1859
Donation Land Claims. I have seen a map of them in the Portland Area.
https://historicoregoncity.org/2019/04/03/land-claims/
https://gfo.org/resources/indexes/pioneer/donation-land-claims.html

CEMETERIES
1882 - River View Cemetery https://www.greenwoodhillscemetery.org/uploads/History_of_GHC_ColorPic.pdf
1882 - Greenwood Hill Cemetery
1882 - Grand Army of the Republic
1871 - Ahavai Shalom Cemetery
???? - Beth Israel Cemetery

SCHOOLS
Collins View School dedicated in 1937, closed in 1976.
(used for various other things)
Riverdale High School bought the building and has a 20 year lease on the property.
Capitol Hill school (not technically inside Collins View per se)

CHURCHES
Palatine Hill Road Church - 1947  (Not 1941?)
St Mark Presbyterian Church
Mt Carmel Lutheran Church

ESTATES
1920's Fir Acres, a grand estate developed by Lloyd Frank and designed by Herman Brookman.

COLLEGE
1942 Lewis & Clark College (Albany College) acquired the Frank Estate.
The College renamed itself when moving to their new location. (Separate story!)
Lewis & Clark College acquired Franciscan Renewal Center for York Graduate Center.
Northwestern School of Law, later renamed L&C Law School. (built before 1971!)
Lewis & Clark Ball Field (adj to 4th ave)
Watzek Library.
Agnes Flannigan Chapel built ...197o-ish

STREETS & BRIDGE(s)
Boones Ferry and Taylors Ferry Roads.
Jesse Van Bibber Boone, established the ferry at Wilsonville in 1847
When roads and streets were put in.
Ferry operating on Spokane Street. Any riverboat landing?
First Terwilliger Bridge (was recycled from original Vista Bridge)
Terwilliger Bridge Replacement.
Street re-naming
The Leading 0 project

TRAFFIC
BFR Speed Bumps and Half-Closure
PHR Speed Bumps (near college)
Traffic Circle at Law School
Sidewalk along west side of Terwilliger (Previous extruded asphalt curb).

TRANSIT
Bus service... #40 Capitol Hill to L&C, #43 Taylors Ferry
#39 to Fred Meyer
#39 routed to Hillsdale
Trolley from Portland to Fulton Park (1890) and on to Cemeteries (1891-1899)

LAND DEVELOPMENT
Annexations to City (date1, date2)
When were the various TRACTS formed? eg Killpatrick-Collins
SW 6th Development
Colony Drive
South Ridge
Water Tank on SW Alice.

PARKS
River View Natural Area http://riverviewfriends/history.html
Marshall Park (city park, rescued land from developers)
Formation of Tryon Creek State Park

BUSINESSES
Collins View Grocery
Burlingame Feed Store
Burlingame Grocery (1930s? - 2001)
Market of Choice (16 years, from 2003 to 2019)
Burlingame TV since 1952
Wayne's Barbur Shop
In 1970's -- 4 gas stations @ Terw/TF corner: Chevron/P66/Union76/Shell.

HISTORY of UTILITIES / INFRASTRUCTURE
Fire hall
Water / indoor plumbing
Electrification
USPS Mail Delivery (Never a PO?)
Phone Service
Sewer System
Storm Water Drainage System

COMMUNITY
Dance Hall
CVNA formed

WEATHER and FIRE EVENTS
October 12, 1962
Columbus Day Storm knocked over about 100 trees just on the college campus.
It did so much damage in the city, that schools were closed for a week.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbus_Day_Storm_of_1962

9/18/2001, one week after 9/11, Burlingame Grocery was consumed by owner/arsonist fire.