Local author shares the history of Southwest’s immigrants

By Jessie Kirk

The Southwest Community Connection, Jan 29, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009

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To write her first book, Olsen took her photos to a woman she knew would have the answers about each building’s history. Gussie Reinhardt was well known in Portland’s Jewish community and at 96 had a wealth of knowledge to share.

“I knew she had grown up here,” Olsen said. “I showed her the pictures and she told me the stories.”

“A Walking Tour of Historic Jewish Portland” details 14 places in the community that were important in the early 1900s like Kesser Israel Synagogue, Lair Hill Market, the original Neighborhood House and Failing School, where 90 percent of the students were children of immigrants.

Olsen’s second book, published in August, expands on the topic by including the history of Italian immigrants as told through histories and anecdotes of the immigrants’ children and grandchildren. She spent about two years interviewing people who had lived in the neighborhood and transcribing their tales. She came away with a wealth of stories – like how Duniway Park was once a hole in the ground that was filled with garbage to make a park, how many of the parents were junk peddlers and how the area was a self-contained immigrant community.

“First Avenue in Portland was like Delancy Street in New York City,” explained Jerry Stern, who was born in 1926 and lived in South Portland. “There were butchers and little grocery stores, Mosler’s Bakery and Dr. Wolfe’s barbershop. In those days not only did the barber cut hair and do shaves but if you had a problem he’d put leeches on.”

Through her books, Olsen, a retired software engineer for HP, has found a new passion for writing stories of interesting people. She is currently working on a book about Oregonians who work with animals and has written several articles for national magazines from “Grit” to “Cat Fancy.”

“One thing that I always cared about a lot was I wanted to make the oral history accessible to people,” she said.

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