
Offbeat Oregon History podcast
by www.offbeatoregon.com (finn @ offbeatoregon.com)
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Did ‘Vortex I’ prevent riots in downtown Portland?
Jun 24, 2026
Unknown duration
McCall expected ‘Vortex I’ to cost him re-election
Jun 23, 2026
Unknown duration
Riot at PSU set the stage for ‘Governor’s Pot Party’
Jun 22, 2026
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Yachter’s treasure caught FBI’s interest too late
Jun 19, 2026
Unknown duration
Portland's Vaudeville mayor made city famous as well as notorious
Jun 18, 2026
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| Date | Episode | Topics | Guests | Brands | Places | Keywords | Sponsor | Length | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6/24/26 | ![]() Did ‘Vortex I’ prevent riots in downtown Portland? | On that tense late-August weekend, tens of thousands of young people enjoyed themselves at McIver Park, while the much-dreaded riots failed to materialize. Was there a connection? Many voters thought so. (McIver Park, Clackamas County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1406c.291.vortex-the-event.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/23/26 | ![]() McCall expected ‘Vortex I’ to cost him re-election | When McCall green-lighted the plan to distract potential street rioters with a week-long music festival, he fully expected to lose his job for it — whether it worked or not. (Salem, Marion County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1406b.290.vortex-part2-the-family.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/22/26 | ![]() Riot at PSU set the stage for ‘Governor’s Pot Party’ | To Governor Tom McCall, it looked like Portland was about to explode, and there was nothing he could do to prevent it ... until two long-haired young people came to his chief of staff with a very unusual plan. (Portland, Multnomah County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1406a.vortex-part1-psu-riot.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/19/26 | ![]() Yachter’s treasure caught FBI’s interest too late | DAWN WAS JUST breaking, and Tom McAdams had just barely crawled into bed, when he got the alarm. A 50-foot sailboat was washing ashore near Waldport. McAdams had been up all night escorting a leaking fishing boat into port after it got caught in a bad storm 20 miles offshore. Now it was the morning of Dec. 13, 1973, and it was his wife Joanne’s birthday. He’d planned on snatching four or five hours of sleep and then maybe doing something with Joanne. Instead, he was sprinting across the street to Newport’s U.S. Coast Guard station, jumping a fence, and bounding into his 44-foot rescue lifeboat. McAdams was a master chief petty officer in the U.S. Coast Guard (and still is, albeit retired; he’s now in his 80s). In 1973 he was the commander of the Newport station, and was already probably the most famous enlisted man in Coast Guard history, a title he certainly holds today. By the time he retired in 1977 he had personally rescued hundreds of people, and taught hundreds of other rescuers how it was done. On this particular morning, though, there wouldn’t be much for McAdams to do. He raced out across the Yaquina Bay bar — which was rough, but it takes a lot to stop a 44 from crossing any river bar — and turned south. But by the time he’d gone a mile or so, the station radioed that the yacht had gone up on the beach, out of reach for a rescue boat. Other Coasties, rescue swimmers Greg Albrecht, Lewis Cavina and Bill Masten, were on their way down Highway 101 to the beach; saving the people on the boat would be up to them. When the rescue swimmers arrived, they found a middle-aged couple struggling feebly in the icy surf in their life jackets, trying to swim to shore. The rescuers quickly got them out of the water and onto dry land. Job done? Well, no. Because it turned out the boat's owner had his life savings, in gold, stuffed up under the cabin vent ... (Newport and Waldport, Lincoln County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/21-06.mysterious-yacht-gold-rescue-McAdams-598.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/18/26 | ![]() Portland's Vaudeville mayor made city famous as well as notorious | Adorably boisterous and hearty, Mayor George Baker was the life of every party. But if you were a supporter of organized labor or an anti-war activist, he and his “Mayor's Secret Police” goons were not your friends. (Portland, Multnomah County; 1910s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1401b.george-baker-portlands-vaudeville-mayor.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/17/26 | ![]() When The Oregonian newspaper burgled a candidate’s home | Will Daly had earned the sworn enmity of the newspaper's publisher, Henry Pittock, by exposing his plan to steal city water for his lush West Hills estate. But Pittock evened the score with a midnight visit to Daly's residence. (Portland, Multnomah County; 1910s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1401a.will-daly-black-bag-job.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/16/26 | ![]() How Stewart Holbrook became Oregon's great storyteller (Part 2 of 2) | 'Hols' Holbrook picked Portland for his new home because it had the best library, in his opinion, on the West Coast. Plus, it was smack in the middle of logging country. Upon arrival, he got a job as an associate editor of 4-L Lumber News. This was the official publication of the Loyal Legion of Loggers and Lumbermen union. This job more or less completed the apprenticeship of Stewart Holbrook as the premier voice of the American Mid-Century Timberman. (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/21-07.stewart-holbrook-599.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/15/26 | ![]() Stewart Holbrook: The literary spirit of mid-century Oregon (Part 1 of 2) | NINETY-EIGHT YEARS ago, in a logging camp deep in the forests of British Columbia, a logger in a funny hat walked up to a big stump, an ax in his hand. Taking off the hat — it was a battered bowler, an old-fashioned dandy’s hat even in 1923 — he laid it on the stump, set a nail in it, and drove it in. Then he turned and walked away. Probably he walked straight to the logging locomotive for his last ride into town. Nailing the hat to the stump was a symbolic act — Stewart H. Holbrook was quitting the logging business forever. ... (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/21-07.stewart-holbrook-599.html) | — | ||||||
| 6/12/26 | ![]() How a national mythology was made from massacre✨ | national mythologymassacre+3 | — | Cayuse tribe | Waiilatpu | national mythologymassacre+5 | — | 15m 37s | |
| 6/11/26 | ![]() Marcus Whitman: The man behind the myths and the massacre✨ | historymythmaking+3 | — | Offbeat Oregon | — | Marcus WhitmanNarcissa Whitman+6 | — | 13m 49s | |
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| 6/10/26 | ![]() Portland home of world’s only working P.T. boat✨ | historymaritime+3 | — | PT-658 | PortlandMultnomah County+1 | PT-658P.T. boat+3 | — | 8m 53s | |
| 6/9/26 | ![]() After logger’s murder, bordello madam vanished✨ | murdermystery+4 | — | — | LinkvilleKlamath County | murderbordello+5 | — | 9m 57s | |
| 6/8/26 | ![]() Cayuse tribe’s amazing ponies are now very rare✨ | Cayuse tribeCayuse ponies+4 | — | Cayuse ponyCayuse tribe | PendletonUmatilla County | Cayuse ponyJoe Crabb+6 | — | 9m 04s | |
| 6/5/26 | ![]() Famous dance hall hosted Berry, Cash, many more✨ | dance hallsmusic history+3 | — | — | The CottonwoodsLebanon+1 | dance hallElvis+5 | — | 9m 20s | |
| 6/4/26 | ![]() The notorious Tusko led
a colorful and tragic life✨ | elephantsOregon history+4 | — | Tusko the MagnificentTusko the Unwanted | Oregon State FairPortland+1 | Tuskoelephant+6 | — | 11m 35s | |
| 6/3/26 | ![]() Lotus Isle, Oregon’s most surreal amusement park✨ | amusement parksOregon history+4 | — | — | Lotus IsleTomahawk Island+3 | Lotus Isleamusement park+5 | — | 9m 29s | |
| 6/2/26 | ![]() Pirates were defeated in Yaquina Bay Oyster Wars✨ | piratesoyster wars+4 | — | Siletz Indians | Yaquina BayNewport+1 | oysterspirates+5 | — | 9m 24s | |
| 6/1/26 | ![]() NASA’s ‘Moon Trees’ have roots in Oregon forest fire✨ | NASAmoon trees+3 | — | U.S. Forest Service | Oregon State UniversityCape Canaveral | NASAmoon trees+3 | — | 8m 36s | |
| 5/29/26 | ![]() ‘Rajneesh’ or ‘Osho’? In Oregon, his name is mud (Part 4 of 4) | AFTER THE ELECTION, the new formerly homeless residents of Rajneeshpuram were the most pressing problem for Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and his followers. They cost a lot of money to feed and house, and they started fights and made trouble. Rajneeshee leaders started out giving them bus tickets home, but that got very expensive very fast. After all, it had cost $1 million to bring them in by busloads; sending them home one or two at a time would be many times more than that. So finally, the Rajneeshees gave up and, herding them all aboard buses, simply hauled them to downtown Madras and dropped them off. Social-services agencies were forced to take on the task of getting them all home. The Salvation Army alone spent more than $100,000 taking care of them. (Near The Dalles, Wasco County; 1980s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/23-08d.rajneeshpuramPart4of5.html) | — | ||||||
| 5/28/26 | ![]() Rajneeshees’ doom sealed by scheme to seize power (Part 3 of 4) | The Rajneeshee takeover of Antelope was not an anodyne bureaucratic exercise. To those who lived through it, it really did feel like a foreign military power had rolled into their town and occupied it. It started out very stealthily. Several properties in the town were up for sale, and suddenly there were offers on all of them. Very ordinary-looking people signed the documents and took possession. Then some more very ordinary-looking people moved into the properties.... (Rajneeshpuram, Wasco County; 1980s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/23-08c.rajneeshpuramPart3of5.html) | — | ||||||
| 5/27/26 | ![]() Rajneeshees got on well with neighbors ... at first (Part 2 of 4) | ON JUNE 1, 1981, Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh boarded a Boeing 747 for a flight from Mumbai to New York City. Officially the trip was for medical treatment, and authorities were told he’d be heading back home to India afterward. But Rajneesh was not planning on returning. His movement, which had already become an international octopus with meditation centers in dozens of different countries around the world, had outgrown the Pune campus. He needed a new World Headquarters. And his new personal secretary, Ma Anand Sheela (formerly known as Sheela Patel Silverman), had found one for him. Sheela closed the deal for the property then known as the Big Muddy Ranch the following month, paying $5.75 million for it. It was 64,229 acres of Central Oregon rangeland with only the amenities one would expect a family ranch to have. And in late August, she chartered a Learjet to fly the guru in to see, for the first time, the dry landscape that was to be his new home. (Big Muddy Ranch, Wasco and Jefferson County; 1980s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/23-08b.rajneeshpuramPart2of5.html) | — | ||||||
| 5/26/26 | ![]() Rajneeshpuram: Oregon’s most (in)famous ashram (Part 1 of 4) | ONCE UPON A time in India, a man lived. He would go on to become one of the most influential thinkers in new-age thought, but at this time — the early 1960s — he was merely a philosophy teacher, and one of thousands of gurus living and discoursing in that land of gurus. His name was Chandra Mohan Jain. But even then, just a few years out of graduate school, Jain was different. To call him charismatic would be a colossal understatement. By all accounts, this man could look into your eyes and speak to you for a half hour, and you would hurry home to sell all your earthly possessions to stay near him. He was charismatic enough that, by 1966, he was drawing big enough crowds and making fat enough cash on the speaking circuit to quit his teaching job at the University of Jabalpur, seven years after taking it, to focus on his “side hustle” as an independent guru. (Near Antelope, Wasco County; 1980s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/23-08.rajneeshpuramPart1of5.html) | — | ||||||
| 5/25/26 | ![]() Opium culture a forgotten part of urban underworld | A century ago, the drug had a dark, smoky allure for the 'fast' young men and women of Oregon cities, and smuggling routes through Portland were supplying the entire West Coast with the exotic, deadly stuff. (Portland, Multnomah County; 1890s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1402a.opium-culture-portland-urban-underworld.html) | — | ||||||
| 5/22/26 | ![]() The ex-Oregonian who got the U.S. into World War II: Yosuke Matsuoka (#6 of series of 6 related episodes) | Ever wonder why Hitler declared war on the U.S. after Pearl Harbor, despite some really obvious reasons why it wasn't a good idea? Here's the real reason: In April of 1941, while visiting Hitler in Berlin, Japanese Foreign Minister Yosuke Matsuoka, who grew up on the old Portland waterfront, induced Hitler to do a little bragging and to get carried away while talking about what Germany might do in a war with the U.S. “Germany would wage a vigorous war against America with U-boats and the Luftwaffe, and with her greater experience,” he assured Matsuoka. “This would be more than a match for America.” That’s when he said it: “If Japan gets into a conflict with the United States, Germany on her part will take the necessary steps at once.” With that, Japan had the personal pledge of the head of the German state that if war came, they’d back them up. And, of course, eight months later, they did. (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/22-11.matsuoka-imperial-japan-615.html) | — | ||||||
| 5/21/26 | ![]() Japan's most influential diplomat of all time grew up in Portland (#5 of series of 6 related episodes) | IT MAY BE true that the movement of a butterfly’s wings on one side of the world can seed a tornado on the other. But whether it’s literally true or not, it certainly is figuratively true, and nowhere is it better demonstrated than in the case of 1890s businessman and opium smuggler William Dunbar of Portland, Oregon. If we could take Dunbar out of the stream of history before about 1890, we would derail events that led directly to Imperial Japan’s alliance with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy in 1940; to Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor the following year; to the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945; and (maybe) to the fact that the world did not end in a multi-gigaton nuclear fireball in late October of 1962. All this, because a politically well-connected drug smuggler in tiny, faraway Portland was unusually incompetent, and had taken a young Japanese boy into his household as a companion for his 14-year-old son. That little boy’s name was Yosuke “Frank” Matsuoka, the future Foreign Minister of Imperial Japan and the chief architect of the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy, just before the Second World War.... (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/22-11.matsuoka-imperial-japan-615.html) | — | ||||||
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