Letters to the Editor

Your editor is not a Portland native, although I am now – by choice – a Portlander for life. I grew up in a small town in California, eventually getting college-educated near, and working in, the second largest city in the United States – which is also in California.

In 1975 when promoted by the company I was working for to a job here in Portland, one of the things I learned first, aside from the changeability of the weather (which I found a plus – and there were actually four seasons here), was that Portland had a remarkable attitude about itself, even though it was a major city! It didn’t take long to learn that it actually thought of itself as a small town. Or, actually, a collection of small towns.

The neighborhoods in this city all had distinctive characters, each different from others, and more often than not each had its own business district, history, and local traditions. But there was one tradition that united the whole city – the Rose Festival each spring. In the state I came from, there was no such event or festival that so united people in towns or cities of any size. It still expresses, in a way even small towns don’t anymore, both a sense of history and a sense of this city as home.

And now, with the COVID-19 pandemic in remission – although this disease is now likely to linger amongst us always, as the flu does – the Rose Festival is fully back for us this year to participate in and enjoy.

One of the two simultaneous events that mark its official start in 2023 happened on April 29th – the “82nd Avenue of Roses Parade”, which starts at Eastport Plaza and ends up many blocks north. This year, the weather was sunny and clear, and very comfortable in the low 80 degree range. It was a delight to be able to enjoy a Portland parade without raingear and an umbrella! But it would have been great either way. 82nd Avenue in Southeast Portland marks the geographical center of the City of Portland. Did you know that?

And, notably, the very last official event of the Rose Festival each year also happens in Inner Southeast Portland – the Westmoreland Park Milk Carton Boat Races, starting at noon at the historic Depression-era “casting pond” in that park – this year, it’s on Sunday, June 25th. The event is put on by the Royal Rosarians, and it’s celebrating its 50th anniversary this year! As usual, THE BEE will be there covering it, and we hope you’ll bring yourself and the family and enjoy it too.

In between these events are two more major parades – the Starlight, in the evening downtown, on June 3rd; and the Grand Floral Parade on Saturday morning, June 10th, which currently does not even go downtown anymore – staying on the east side of the river, from its origin at the Memorial Coliseum at the east end of the Broadway Bridge, to its conclusion in the southeast corner of Lloyd Center.

There are many, many other events of all kinds, big and small, associated with the Rose Festival, and we hope you’ll have the opportunity to enjoy or get involved in many of them.

A City of Portland without the Rose Festival would just not be the same city, nor would it be Portland without its distinct neighborhoods – little villages next to each other, all over this city.

As a city, we certainly have had our problems recently; some with origins in the way the city is governed, and the voters of Portland have taken steps to improve that with an updated and more effective form of city government on its way.

But we are Portlanders, and we tend to nurture optimism – particularly with the return, each spring, of the Rose Festival! Get out there and enjoy it.