Hawthorne Bridge 100 Years Old

It is a bit of a coincidence that I have a chapter in my memoir-in-progress that refers to my first notice of the Hawthorne Bridge. I was a kid visiting my sister here in Portland when I first became cognizant of the bridge's unique elements. The bridge is the oldest of its kind in the United States.

Here is a brief excerpt from my memoir:


Steel Bridges

Portland, Oregon had inspired me from an early age. For a kid growing up in a rural environment at the edge of the great Willamette Valley, the city represented irresistible mystery and an intoxicating vibrancy. When I visited my sister in Northwest Portland, I felt as if I was living inside a great adventure movie. I was the lead character, walking down the street with the camera’s lens following my every step. I was an actor in a serious movie about a youth and I might do something heroic in the next moment.

I enjoyed looking at the faces of strangers—an old man walking with a cane. He seemed nice because he smiled and put me at ease. Women who dressed differently than the women I watched in my home town. People who acted differently than the people I knew. I didn’t know what to make of these strangers. How could I begin to interpret their madness, their weariness, and the experiences that made them so different? I was a youngster. I didn’t know anything about adulthood or the lives of others. All I could do is feel life and absorb the newness that surrounded me and gave me an odd sense of joy and wonderment—a new reality.

The city’s architecture dazzled me with its mixture of tall, glass structures and old buildings crafted from brick and mortar. Colors leaped out at me as I walked through my sister’s neighborhood. I discovered parks that were unlike any in my home town. They were greener, manicured and labyrinthine. The great trees were different than the pine and fir that sheltered me in the woods near my home, though there were plenty of those, too. What did I know about the variety of trees and plants? Nothing! What did I know except the Hardy Boys, Boy’s Life and baseball? Nothing!

Portland’s bridges fascinated me. I would come to learn there were eight of them in the city proper. They were huge and odd-looking, much different than the old, wooden-covered bridge I knew at my swimming hole on the Santiam River, near Foster. These bridges were made of steel, twisted and formed in unique patterns, mazes of iron and wire. I watched the Hawthorne Bridge rise, its middle section elevating mysteriously above the Willamette River. How? Then I noticed the large windowed booth atop the bridge. That’s it, I realized. Someone is in there! Someone sits up there! That, I thought, would be a great place to spend the day, just watching things. Raising the bridge, looking out at the long curve of the river, waiting for another boat to pass under the bridge on the way to—where? I learned that was someone’s job! How great would that be? I thought.

TS