Whoop, Whoop! Remembering Portland's Bud Clark

 

Oregonians of a certain generation know the significance of hearing someone go Whoop, Whoop!. It was the eccentric catchphrase of citizen Mayor Bud Clark. He passed away earlier this month, just a month after his 90th birthday. Portlanders all know the story of Bud Clark. The owner of the Goose Hollow Inn that took on the unlikely task of running against Mayor Frank Ivancie. No one was paying attention when they should have and Clark pulled out a shocking win with 54% of the vote in 1984. 

It shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone that Clark, as a community small business owner had become a community activist. He served on several local boards and helped revitalize the Goose Hollow neighborhood. Fearing that citizens were going to left with the same old leaders that were wasting chances to improve things for the city he made the unlikely decision to enter the race for Portland Mayor. 

Portland Made Humphrey Stickers

We have recently come across a green HHH sticker made in Portland, Oregon. For a long time we had known of the smaller blue HHH sticker. Many members have it in their collections. Both of these stickers have Portland, Oregon union stickers on the face. Pretty neat to find a second sticker.

The two stickers have different photos of HHH in them, but with the same slogan. Note that the different union bugs are position in the same location on each sticker. It makes me wonder why a photo of Humphrey and Muskie were not used on these stickers, even if the stickers mention both candidates.

Jim Francesconi for City Council 1996

The 2014 Oregon Primary saw the return of a Portland politico Jim Francesconi to the ballot for the first time in a decade. In 2004 he lost a hotly contested race for Portland Mayor to Tom Potter. After shakeups on the Multnomah County Commission Francesconi came back to announce his campaign for Multnomah County Chair.

While he ended up losing to Deborah Kafoury in May, I thought it would be interesting if we could track down some items from his time on the Portland City Council. He was first elected in 1996. Beating both Gail Shibley and Erik Sten in the May primary. Sten would still get elected in 1996 thanks to a special election later in September for Commissioner position 2.

Charles Jordan Remembered

Over the weekend former Portland City Commissioner Charles Jordan passed away. Jordan was appointed to his seat in 1974 and was elected to a full term that May. He faced 14 opponents in the primary. Over 98,000 votes were cast and Jordan managed to grab over 30,000 of them. His nearest challenger, Gene Anderson, took just over 10,000 votes. Both men would face off in the November General Election. Jordan would come out on top again over Anderson. He would be elected to serve on the commission with future Mayor Frank Ivancie, and Auditor Mildred Schwab.

Here is a bumper sticker from that first primary campaign in 1974.

The 'new face' was a creative take on two different aspects of his appointment. First, that he was already on the city council and that he was first African American to serve and be elected in Portland on the council.

Oregon's Earl Blumenauer on the Trail since 1970

1981 City Council Button

Earl Blumenauer has been a fixture of Portland politics since the 1970s. One of the few that has served in just about every level of government offered in Portland.  He got his start by organizing the Go 19 campaign in 1970. This would have lowered the voting age in Oregon to 19. While this effort was unsuccessful, it helped push pressure towards the passage of the twenty-sixth Amendment that lowered the voting age to 18 in 1972.

Winning a seat in the Oregon House of Representatives in 1972 and was re-elected in 1974 and 1976. During this time he was also attending law school and working at Portland State University. In 1978 he won a seat on the Multnomah County Commission and during his term sought a seat on the Portland City Council in 1981. He would lose this race to Margaret Strachan.

It wouldn't be until the late 80s when another opportunity opened up for Blumenauer to vie for a seat on the city council. This time he would win and serve there until his election to congress in 1996.

While on the city council, Blumenauer was able to work on transportation issues and was the Commissioner of Public Works for the city. It was during his time on the city council that Blumenauer went up against Vera Katz in the open mayoral election in 1992. While he would lose this race, he continued to serve on the city council and that allowed him the opportunity to run to replace Ron Wyden after he advanced to the U.S. Senate in 1996.

Des Connall Remembered

Another former District Attorney has passed away this year. You might recall we had a previous post about Harl Haas, today, as reported through local media sources, former Multnomah District Attorney Des Connall passed away due to complications from heart surgery.

He served as district attorney of Multnomah county from 1970-1972. Connall was defeated by Haas for re-election as DA in 1972. Here are two pins from his 1972 campaign.