Offbeat Oregon History podcast

The job got off to a bad start when the fireman escaped and sprinted for the nearby town. The main suspect in the robbery quickly left town, and a few months later was killed in a streetcar holdup in Washington. (Roseburg, Douglas County; 1890s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1502c.roseburg-train-robbery-jack-case.326.html)

The “Baritone Bandit” led a small group of desperados with a large cache of dynamite, and they got away with a good bit of loot from the Douglas County robbery. But one of the passengers saw behind the bandit's mask ... (Cow Creek Canyon, Douglas County; 1890s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1502b.cow-creek-train-robbery.325.html)

For more than 40 years, amateurs and pros alike have put forward dozens of theories, many quite plausible and backed with some evidence. But the story seems destined to remain a delicious historical mystery. (Statewide; 1970s, 1980s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1306d-db-cooper-part4-the-theories.html)

The hunt for the man who called himself Dan Cooper started just hours after he disappeared into the night sky with a bag of $20 bills tied to his waist. Did he get away? Did anyone find him? The search continues to this day. (Part 3 of 4 parts) (Portland, Multnomah County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1306c-db-cooper-part-3-the-hunt.html)

After demanding four parachutes and a knapsack of $20 bills, the legendary anonymous skyjacker disappeared into the night sky over southwest Washington with $200,000 — touching off a massive manhunt. (Part 2 of 4 parts) (Columbia River, Multnomah County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1306b-db-cooper-part-2-the-getaway.html)

History's only unsolved hijacking drama started at Portland International Airport when a nondescript man calling himself 'Dan Cooper' stepped aboard a Boeing 727 bound for Seattle. (Part 1 of a 4-part series) (Portland, Multnomah County; 1970s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1306a-db-cooper-part-1-the-skyjacking.html)

Most people think the first paper was the Oregon Spectator, but an irascible local political gadfly named Charles Edward “Philosopher” Pickett (writing as “The Curltail Coon”) stole a march on the bigger paper using only a pen and ink. (Oregon City, Clackamas County; 1840s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1007a_flumgudgeon.html)

NEARLY 50 YEARS ago, the Good Friday Earthquake changed Alaska forever. It killed nine people and slammed the West Coast with tsunamis that killed 122 more, including four in Oregon. It did something else, too, though: It heaved up the seafloor of the Inside Passage near the ghost town of Katalia by a good 12 feet. And in the process, it brought something up to the surface that was a very important piece of the history of Alaska … and, earlier, Oregon. It was a small wooden-hulled steamship with a screw propeller. Most of the wood had been eaten away by time and wildlife, but the steam engine and other hard parts were still there and visible. This wrecked ship turned out to be the remains of the S.S. Portland, the most famous steamer in Alaska’s history, the one that kicked off the Klondike Gold Rush when it arrived in Seattle in 1897 with the famous “ton of gold” on board. The Portland was almost like the mascot of the Klondike Gold Rush, so Alaskan history buffs were very excited about the find. But Alaska wasn’t the only state with cause for celebration. The Portland had a prominent role in Oregon’s history too. It had been as notorious in early-1890s Portland as it became famous in late-1890s Alaska. Before the ship was bought by a Seattle shipping company and renamed the S.S. Portland, its name was the S.S. Haytian Republic. It was based out of Portland, and it was probably the most notorious smuggling ship on the West Coast. It was operated by a group of smugglers whose clumsiness and ineptitude was like something out of a Keystone Cops comedy, so its name was in the newspapers a lot. Every reader in Portland knew that ship, and knew the names of its owners: Nat Blum and William Dunbar of the Merchants Steamship Company. (Portland, Multnomah County; 1890s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/22-12.blum-dunbar-opium-smugglers-616.html)

At the scene of a notorious double-murder of young lovers Larry Peyton and Beverly Allan, police paid little attention to Edward W. Edwards and soon eliminated him as a suspect. But if they'd dug a little bit deeper ... (Portland, Multnomah County; 1950s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1305a-peyton-allan-murders-manwiththehook.html)

It was known for spectacular scenery, enormous waterfalls and whitewater stretches, and phenomenal fishing; we've traded that for a placid, lake-like waterway and cheap hydroelectric power. (Celilo Village, Wasco County; 1950s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/H1009a_celilo-falls-part-of-once-wild-Columbia.html)

Riverboat-brothel operator Nancy Boggs took customers from both sides of the river, paid no liquor taxes to City Hall; in 1870s Oregon, it was the money, not the morals, that rankled. (Note: Historians differ on how much off this story is true and how much is waterfront legend. My take, if you're curious, is that it's probably about 65% truth, 35% folklore.) (Portland, Multnomah County; 1880s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/H1007d_floating-bordello-in-portland.html)

In the mid-1870s, a fast-talking East Coast hustler teamed up with a famous half-Native Indian scout to cash in on his fame with a line of dodgy faux-Indian patent remedies — and the Oregon Indian Medicine Co. was born. (Warm Springs Indian Reservation; 1880s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1812c.ka-ton-ka-donald-mckay-warm-springs-indian-medicine.html)

Smooth, polished, well-connected and ruthless, Larry Sullivan was essentially the Boss Tweed of the Portland waterfront from the early 1890s right up to the moment the music stopped. But in 1904, as the upcoming Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition drew near, a reforming spirit was in the Portland air. Thousands of visitors were about to come to Portland and see it for the first time, and the city’s underworld was far too much on public display for that to go well if changes were not made. Larry Sullivan *was* the Portland underworld, and he had good enough political instincts to know when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em. Selling his stake in the Portland Club, his gambling house, to fellow underworld tycoon Nate Solomon and closing the doors on his sailors’ boardinghouse, Larry packed up and headed east, looking for fresh fields of endeavor. And, in a rip-roaring Nevada mining boomtown called Goldfield, he found what he was looking for. And it was at The Palace that Larry met one of the most colorful and rascally characters in the history of American con-artistry: George Graham Rice. (Goldfield, Nev.; 1900s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/20-09.larry-sullivan-goldfield-swindles.html)

Is there a lost crystal cave in central Oregon somewhere, lined with thousands of quartz crystals? Or is the whole thing just a legend? If it's real, maybe it would be better if we never found out .... (Deschutes and Crook counties, 1890s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1811a.central-oregon-lost-crystal-cave-520.html)

Gasping for hard currency to finance the Civil War, and awash in raw gold from two Eastern Oregon gold rushes, the federal government tried to build a mint in The Dalles in 1863. But the Oregon delegation, dominated by Portland interests, held up the plans for years trying to switch its location to Portland ... finally, the gold rush petered out, and the feds said, 'Never mind!' (The Dalles, Wasco County; 1860s) (For text and pictures, see https://offbeatoregon.com/1810d.the-dalles-mint-that-wasnt-519.html)