An Architectural Guidebook To Portland

Our hard-working staff put in extra hours to insure that only the highest quality facts made it into the second edition of the Guidebook. And for a brief, shining moment, OSU Press’s version of An Architectural Guidebook to Portland was error-free.

That is, it was unblemished until gimlet-eyed reader Peter Milkov (visit his work at http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/ci/?id=101329) noted a number of items, including the fact that Big Pink is ten feet shorter than the Wells Fargo Tower, not eight feet, as a Guidebook intern foolishly wrote.

Further, we suspect an Arlington Club member of having snuck into the printer’s to substitute a picture of his club with the photo of the University Club that should have run on page 63. Mr. Milkov was kind enough to provide us with an excellent one below:

Finally, GBD Architects should have been credited with the design of the 200 Market Building (p. 109). Whether the firm of Rudat, Boutwell & Partners should be co-credited remains to be discovered.

Readers lucky enough to have the FIRST edition of the Guidebook (it’s a collector’s item!) may wish to refer to the following notes.

Interesting trivia: The initial cover designs for this book read “An architectural guidebook to Portland.” (Note the capitalization.)

The book’s title was eventually capitalized correctly, but acute observers will notice that the “drop shadow” behind the cover’s title letters still clearly show the previous lowercase “a” and “g” in the words “Architectural Guidebook.”

As a side-note, the book’s original color scheme featured bright yellow and red, giving the book an American Southwest look.

Error: On the copyright page is the information that every author yearns for; the Library of Congress entry his work will appear under, where it will live forever, regardless of how quickly the book goes out of print.

It is there that you will see the author’s name listed as “Bark King.”

Incorrectly regarded as an error: In the author’s introduction (page vii), there is reference to the fact that Francis Pettygrove named Portland, Oregon after the capital of Maine. While readers will note that Augusta is currently Maine’s capital city, Portland served as capital from 1820 to 1832.

Addendum: Reader Julio Rocha has observed that the book neglects to name the designer in charge of the restoration of the Governor Hotel and the Princeton Building (both in the first DOWNTOWN chapter, page 45). Mr. Rocha writes, “anyone who is familiar with the (Governor), and especially the state of the building prior to restoration would probably agree that it deserves recognition . . . The Governor . . . could easily have gone the way of the ‘Urban Outfitters’ building had it not been for the team of dedicated people that worked on it under the guidance of Don Stastny, FAIA, FAICP.”

While Mr. Rocha works for Don Stastny, his comments are still well taken.

Addendum: In the entry for the 1000 Broadway Building (third DOWNTOWN chapter, page 77), Tom Moyer is noted as the only downtown developer who has erected Portland skyscrapers and is also in the Portland Sports Hall of Fame. Contractor Don Schollander is a local real estate developer who might also qualify if he has ever shot a rivet into a beam of a tall local building. (He won four gold medals in swimming at the 1964 Olympics.)

Possible Error: In the entry for the Dekum Building (YAMHILL chapter, page 147), the color-coordinated terra cotta is referred to as “glazed.” University of Oregon professor Lee Roth was recently overheard describing them as “unglazed.” Hmm . . . and to think that the man who commissioned the building, Frank Dekum, was a confectioner!

Typographical Error: Our apologies to Mike Lindberg whose name was incorrectly spelled as “Lindbergh” in the OLD TOWN/CHINATOWN chapter (page 169). To compound the insult, he is also strangely identified as “Mark Lindbergh” in the index.

Typographical Error: A “lentil” is a bean. A “lintel” is a horizontal support above an opening like a door or window. In the “U.S. Custom House” entry (OLD TOWN/CHINATOWN chapter, page 170), the references to lentils is thus wrong. Many thanks to Renaissance man Andy Lennox for catching this outrageous transgression.

Egregious Error: In the SOUTHWEST chapter in the entry for the Mallory Hotel, reference is made to Congressman Mallory's (1831-1914), “incendiary speech” must have been “in favor of the impeachment of Andrew Jackson.” This is a gross error, as it should read “Andrew Johnson.”

Reader Alan Locklear points out, Jackson “completed his second and last term of office when Mallory was six years old, died in 1845, and from what I recall from my U.S. history, never faced any serious danger of impeachment (which helped get his portrait on the $20 bill).”

“Andrew Johnson, on the other hand, succeeded the fallen Lincoln in 1865, angered the Radical Republicans in Congress, was impeached by the House of Representatives, and tried by the Senate. He was acquitted by one vote.” Johnson’s face appears on no denomination of U.S. currency at all. This bit of fact-checking could have been easily performed by the author, and it is his profound regret that the error made its way into the book.

Typographical Error: Our apologies to the clergy and staff at Saint Thomas More’s Catholic Church. In the SOUTHWEST chapter (page 222), their church’s name is misspelled as “Moore.” This is a particularly annoying mistake as both the original text submitted to the publisher AND the subsequent chapter proofs had the church name spelled correctly.

In short, it wasn’t our fault.

We do not live in a utopia; perhaps a junior typesetter for AN ARCHITECTURAL GUIDEBOOK TO PORTLAND was annoyed with Thomas More’s refusal to acknowledge the validity of King Henry the VIII’s supremacy over the Pope. Interestingly, the typo makes the namesake of the church Thomas Moore (1779-1852), an Irish poet whose work has been criticized for “its shallowness and sentimentality.”