Alameda Census Study Reveals Clues to Neighborhood Life in the 1920s, 1930s
Over a period of about two weeks in April 1930, census taker Jane W. Miller knocked on every door of the Alameda neighborhood with some very personal questions: How old are you? What do you do for a living? Where were you born? What level of education have you achieved? Where were your parents born? What is your home worth? What language did you speak growing up?
The answers to those questions, recorded in her flowing hand on the pages of the Fifteenth Census of the United States, paint a fascinating and revealing picture of Alameda life in the 1930s.
Seventy-five years ago, three of the houses within a one-block stretch of my home on Northeast 30th Avenue had boarders. Here in my house, living with the Walter and Edith Morrison family — a family of five — was Miss Emma Thomas, age 58, a schoolteacher. The Morrisons converted a closet of one bedroom into a sink and wash area-still there today-to accommodate Miss Thomas.
Next door, living with the Eldridge family was Mrs. Eldridge’s 36-year-old sister who was also a teacher. Around the corner, the Taylor family made room for an uncle and a mother-in-law.
Enumerator Jane Miller — that was her official title…enumerator — recorded some of the house guests as relatives. Some she recorded as “boarders,” others were “roomers,” and some were “lodgers.” Roomers, I’m guessing, just lived there. Boarders lived and ate with the family. Lodgers, I’m not too sure what that distinction means.
These days, I’m knee deep in the pages of Jane Miller’s work, and that of her predecessor Agnes M. Padden, who did the enumeration honors during the 14th Census, ten years earlier in 1920. A correlation of the two Alameda neighborhood censuses, paired up with information from city directories, tax and assessment records, and a handful of personal memories from those who witnessed the early days, has helped me to map an understanding of early neighborhood life.
It’s hard not to wonder about the stories of the families, the relatives, the immigrants, and the boarders, who were once settled into the houses we all occupy today. In fact, in the process of comparing the changes during that decade, I’ve had to fold up a census page or two in my pocket, put on my coat, and go for a walk past the house that was once filled with a large family from Armenia, or the one that had a squad of Norwegian servants. Clues to the stories of our houses are there, like a distant echo, that whisper from the pages of the census.
Most of the people who lived in our neighborhood were from somewhere else, which shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, since Portland’s population was booming during these years. “Birthplace: Oregon” is common only among the youngest segment of the population. Many parents were from midwest states, some from the east coast. Some were immigrants, including families from Germany, Armenia, England, Canada and Yugoslavia.
Platted in 1909 and built substantially by 1925, the Alameda Park neighborhood was home to some of Portland’s notable business leaders, and they all show up on the pages of the census. Plywood magnate Thomas Autzen, his wife Marvel, their five children and two “servants,” show up in their mansion at 26th and Alameda. Portland Architect Harry Herzog, his wife Bertha, their three children and “servant” show up on Glenn Avenue (today’s Northeast 32nd Place). Captain Delmar Shaver of Shaver Transportation (a company still in business today), his wife Nellie, their two daughters and Yugoslavian “maid” are there in a big house on The Alameda. Leading Lumbermen including Lester Brix, John Byerly and Egbert Mersereau show up too, as do George and Phyllis Greenfield, proprietors of Greenfield’s Shoes, one of Portland’s largest shoe emporiums.
A quick survey of residents of the original Alameda Park addition, bounded loosely by Northeast 33rd, Prescott, Fremont and 21st, includes roughly the same number of households you might find today. A sampling of professions evident in the census includes bank managers, librarians, school principals, doctors, building contractors, sales managers, newspapermen, and life insurance saleswomen.
A few other somewhat notable occupations show up as well: Herman Bringmann, 74 from Germany, was a cigar maker who lived on Dunckley. Not far down the street was Edward Clark, age 40, a game warden for the surrounding district. Several teenage boys are enumerated as paperboys. A half-dozen foresters appear as well, notable for what was then such a young profession, and what one would think of as being a rural vocation. Speaking of which, over on Northeast 27th lived William Scotton, age 58, listed as a fruit grower and rancher.
Even on the cusp of The Great Depression, some Alameda homes were kept by nannies, maids, cooks and gardeners, typically listed as “servants” in the census. They were mostly young women, typically in their 20s. A listing of nationalities would include: Irish, Norwegian, Swedish, English, Romanian, German, Japanese, Canadian.
In the blink of a page from 1920 to 1930, whole families mature, change and fledge off into the world. The Morrisons, who lived here in my home for 49 years, go from a young family with children at Alameda School in 1920, squarely into middle age, their eldest son Bruce working in Spellman’s grocery at Northeast 15th and Fremont. During those years, some well-off Alameda families prospered and stayed. Others moved on to more upscale addresses elsewhere in the city. With the storm clouds of The Great Depression building over Oregon, some families undoubtedly left Alameda in distress.
It’s hard to imagine, when you walk the sidewalks of our neighborhood, all the family stories and memories that have played out here in the last four generations. Thanks to the census, and the door-to-door questions of Jane Miller and Agnes Padden, clues to these stories remain.
(C) Doug Decker