Little Russia in Portland
From 1881 up to World War I, many Russian Germans settled In Portland, Oregon. Among the first ones was a group from Nebraska in 1882. The Oregon Railway and Navigation Company railroad was being built from Portland to Wallula in 1881 and 1882 so it furnished work for the newcomers. Most of the Germans settled in the Albina Homestead area in the northeast part of the city.
Between 1888 and 1890 a large number of these people emigrated to Portland from the Volga German colonies of Balzer and Frank in Russia. More came from Norka between 1890 and 1895. Eventually there were hundreds of people of Norka origin in the city. Forests had to be removed, houses needed to be built in the growing territory; even so, some of the people moved as far south as Canby. In 1892, Catholic Volga Germans came from Semenowka and Köhler.
The Albina area had its own German grocery stores, butcher shops who made their own sausage (the best in the land), a hardware and furniture store; for instance such as Repp Brother’s Meats and Groceries, Hilderman’s Grocery, Krombein Grocery, Bihn Groceries and Meats, Hergert’s Meat Market, Geist Shoe & Department Store, Weimer’s Hardware and Furniture, Lehl and Popp Grocery, Dänewolf Grocery and Meats to name a few. Mones Shoe Shop was later replaced by Trupp Shoe Repair Shop on Union Avenue established in the late 1930’s until 1958 when the proprietor retired. It is also said that this Albina settlement numbered about 500 families in the 1930’s so that the area was called Little Russia. No section of the City of Roses could boast of such well-kept houses and yards as the proud people, who had been transplanted to a new land with a language handicap, lived here for a short time but took advantage of every opportunity available—hard work, diligence, thrift and cleanliness, a trademark they upheld.
The Volga Germans had their own churches; Ebenezer Church erected first in 1892 headed the list followed by Free Evangelical Brethren in 1900, St. Pauls Evangelical and Reformed, the Second German Congregational in 1913 and Zion Congregational in 1914. The ministers preached their sermons in the German language which was also used in singing of hymns, Sunday school and summer Bible studies for the children who soon became bilingual by attending the public schools. Now only the original one, Ebenezer is still being used by the Russian Germans and up to 1985 still supported a minister who could preach in the German language but services were conducted in English. The other congregations sold their buildings; several rebuilt farther east in hopes of keeping the ethnic group together. In the 1940’s, the ministers had begun a two-sermon experience to accommodate both old and young, a short-lived proposition because the older members realized Americanization of communication was at hand. The old-timers still worshipped in their native tongue at Sunday afternoon prayer meetings into the late sixties.
Grade schools attended in the area included: Albina Homestead, Sabin, Boise, Irvington, Highland, Eliot; high schools--Jefferson, Benson, Commerce, Girl’s Polytechnic. It was rare that children finished the first eight years’ schooling during the early years of settlement. All went to work at an early age so as to help support the family. Teenage boys worked for the Portland Cracker Company. The German Russians seemed a part of the secret of success of the early-day bakeries. The girls were “Mother’s helpers” and took care of children or helped with household chores receiving $5.00 to $8.00 per month. Many of the men folks found work with the railroads, at B.P. John’s or Doernbecher’s Furniture Manufacturing Company. Garbage routes sprang up in Portland and the first haulers consisted of Russian-Germans and Italians; husky men with wagons and horses hitched to a Boston backer used at loading docks in 1918 before the first trucks became available in the 1920’s sufficed. The women found janitorial work in the large buildings downtown or cleaned houses for the well-to-do in the west hills. During the summer months, the mother’s would accompany the children to the berry and hop fields to earn extra money for clothing and school supplies. Tents and cabins provided living quarters with families furnishing bedding, cooking utensils, etc.
A landmark of the locality prevalent in the days before oil heating systems, one found that nearly every family had about three or four cords of slab wood, the outer portion cut from the logs in sawmills, piled up on the parking strip in from of the homes during the summer to dry. Just before school openings in September, a sawyer arrived to cut wood into pieces suitable for the furnace or the pot-bellied stove.
Children had lots of fun playing hide and seek behind the wood piles. It became their responsibility to haul the wood into the basements with wheelbarrows and pile it neatly.
Some people maintained contact with their relatives in Russia up until the bad years of the 1930’s in Russia. In Portland itself, each year fewer of the old timers remain as more obituaries appear in The Oregonian newspaper. The Russian Germans have spread out in the city so that they no longer form a distinct ethnic neighborhood. Little Russia is just a memory now.
Between 1888 and 1890 a large number of these people emigrated to Portland from the Volga German colonies of Balzer and Frank in Russia. More came from Norka between 1890 and 1895. Eventually there were hundreds of people of Norka origin in the city. Forests had to be removed, houses needed to be built in the growing territory; even so, some of the people moved as far south as Canby. In 1892, Catholic Volga Germans came from Semenowka and Köhler.
The Albina area had its own German grocery stores, butcher shops who made their own sausage (the best in the land), a hardware and furniture store; for instance such as Repp Brother’s Meats and Groceries, Hilderman’s Grocery, Krombein Grocery, Bihn Groceries and Meats, Hergert’s Meat Market, Geist Shoe & Department Store, Weimer’s Hardware and Furniture, Lehl and Popp Grocery, Dänewolf Grocery and Meats to name a few. Mones Shoe Shop was later replaced by Trupp Shoe Repair Shop on Union Avenue established in the late 1930’s until 1958 when the proprietor retired. It is also said that this Albina settlement numbered about 500 families in the 1930’s so that the area was called Little Russia. No section of the City of Roses could boast of such well-kept houses and yards as the proud people, who had been transplanted to a new land with a language handicap, lived here for a short time but took advantage of every opportunity available—hard work, diligence, thrift and cleanliness, a trademark they upheld.
The Volga Germans had their own churches; Ebenezer Church erected first in 1892 headed the list followed by Free Evangelical Brethren in 1900, St. Pauls Evangelical and Reformed, the Second German Congregational in 1913 and Zion Congregational in 1914. The ministers preached their sermons in the German language which was also used in singing of hymns, Sunday school and summer Bible studies for the children who soon became bilingual by attending the public schools. Now only the original one, Ebenezer is still being used by the Russian Germans and up to 1985 still supported a minister who could preach in the German language but services were conducted in English. The other congregations sold their buildings; several rebuilt farther east in hopes of keeping the ethnic group together. In the 1940’s, the ministers had begun a two-sermon experience to accommodate both old and young, a short-lived proposition because the older members realized Americanization of communication was at hand. The old-timers still worshipped in their native tongue at Sunday afternoon prayer meetings into the late sixties.
Grade schools attended in the area included: Albina Homestead, Sabin, Boise, Irvington, Highland, Eliot; high schools--Jefferson, Benson, Commerce, Girl’s Polytechnic. It was rare that children finished the first eight years’ schooling during the early years of settlement. All went to work at an early age so as to help support the family. Teenage boys worked for the Portland Cracker Company. The German Russians seemed a part of the secret of success of the early-day bakeries. The girls were “Mother’s helpers” and took care of children or helped with household chores receiving $5.00 to $8.00 per month. Many of the men folks found work with the railroads, at B.P. John’s or Doernbecher’s Furniture Manufacturing Company. Garbage routes sprang up in Portland and the first haulers consisted of Russian-Germans and Italians; husky men with wagons and horses hitched to a Boston backer used at loading docks in 1918 before the first trucks became available in the 1920’s sufficed. The women found janitorial work in the large buildings downtown or cleaned houses for the well-to-do in the west hills. During the summer months, the mother’s would accompany the children to the berry and hop fields to earn extra money for clothing and school supplies. Tents and cabins provided living quarters with families furnishing bedding, cooking utensils, etc.
A landmark of the locality prevalent in the days before oil heating systems, one found that nearly every family had about three or four cords of slab wood, the outer portion cut from the logs in sawmills, piled up on the parking strip in from of the homes during the summer to dry. Just before school openings in September, a sawyer arrived to cut wood into pieces suitable for the furnace or the pot-bellied stove.
Children had lots of fun playing hide and seek behind the wood piles. It became their responsibility to haul the wood into the basements with wheelbarrows and pile it neatly.
Some people maintained contact with their relatives in Russia up until the bad years of the 1930’s in Russia. In Portland itself, each year fewer of the old timers remain as more obituaries appear in The Oregonian newspaper. The Russian Germans have spread out in the city so that they no longer form a distinct ethnic neighborhood. Little Russia is just a memory now.
Source
Pauline Coulter (née Scheierman), "Little Russia in Portland, Oregon." n.p. 1985. The article was submitted to Steven Schreiber by Marie Krieger (née Trupp) and is used with her permission.
Last updated January 11, 2022