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Loading... Portland Confidentialby Phil Stanford
   None No current Talk conversations about this book.  bcstoneb | Oct 1, 2008 |  no reviews | add a review
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It may come as a shock, especially to anyone who has come to regard Portland as a haven for enlightened progressive thought, light rail, and lattes for all, not that long ago -- in fact as recently as the 1950s -- Portland was known throughout the country as a Mecca of vice and sin.Portland Confidential rips the covers from Portland's biggest dirty little secret. It was a side-opentown, with purveyors of all the traditional vices operatingopenly under the noses of the local police. All they had to do was pay off the copsand, of course, their bosses in City Hall.One day in the spring of 1956, it all blew up in everyone's faces with newspaperexposés, indictments of public officials--includingthe chief of police, the districtattorney, and the Mayor--andshameful national headlines.Things got so bad that Bobby Kennedy, then a young lawyer for the SenateRackets Committee, hauled two dozen or so of the town's more colorful charactersback to Washington, DC and grilled them before a national television audience.It couldn't have been more embarrassing.So naturally, when it was all over, everyone came back to town and pretendedit never happened. For decades, it's been Portland's dirty little secret.Not any more, though--it'sall right here inPortland Confidential. No library descriptions found. |
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 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)364.1092Social sciences Social problems and services; associations Criminology Crimes and OffensesLC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.07)
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The subtitle says much of this delicious quasi-exposé of Portland’s colorful history – there’s plenty of sex, crime and corruption to go around. Focusing on the vintage years of 1935-1955, the eminently readable text presents Portland’s seedy underside through the many personalities of the era. And all without a trace of wholesome environmentalism or double lattés!
From its wonderful Weegee-like cover dominated by the imposing figures of Candy Reneé and Big Jim Elkins (different kinds of figures, each, to be sure!), through Stanford’s chatty text with accompanying tabloidy photos, the book is a pure delight. But what really makes the story stick is the coverage -- often quite sympathetic -- of the many colorful personalities in all their small-time glory. The luminaries covered include the aforementioned Ms. Reneé, “Diamond Jim” Purcell, Blubber Maloney, Little Rusty, Tempest Storm, and the ever-present Big Jim Elkins. Even Bugsy Siegel makes a fleeting appearance, stopping by to check out Portland as a place to build one of his casinos. Alas, it rained every day he was in town, so he set his sights southward to the sunny climes of Hollywood and Las Vegas, and the rest, as they say, is history.
If there’s a weakness, it’s that the book stops fairly abruptly, ca. 1957, and many questions linger. When exactly did Portland stop being a corrupt and vice-ridden town, and why? How did a place with such a shadowy history transform itself, relatively quickly, into the Anti-Sleaze city, located at the other end of the legal and ethical spectrum? Who were the principals involved, and when did it take place? Most of all, can we hope for a sequel to sort out all the mysteries? For the moment, however, we’ll have to settle for savoring the current book, and indeed there’s much to savor. Well done, Phil. -- BCS