UPDATE and I miss being out and about, looking for fall foliage to photograph. The next best thing, searching my Flickr account for photos taken in October. 2007.

UPDATE: Saturday's been much like Friday, and I'm thankful for no increase in the fatigue. Leland, my younger son, came over today and did two loads of laundry, figured out what I'd touched on my camera to cause a couple of distracting actions and tried patiently to get stuck in my chemo-addled-mind what to do if/when either one happens again.



Downtown, the elk stands tall on SW Main between two lovely, square block city parks. I really like this statue, The Thompson Elk Fountain. Notice that line of TriMet buses in the background? Since this is October, 2007, the downtown Transit Mall is rerouted to SW Third--the street you see--and SW 4th which is behind me to the west, so that the actual mall on SW 5th and SW 6th could be totally redone which took a couple of years. The building with the teal-colored glass is the Justice Center, home to various courts and one of the Multnomah County jails. I've seen vintage photos of horses hitched into delivery wagons drinking from this fountain, and I've witnessed Portland Police Bureau horses taking a drink from it.



The teal-colored lower floors of the Portland Building look neat against the golden leaves of the gingko trees. Here's a bit about the fountain, from the city's Web site, fountain page: David P. Thompson drove sheep to Portland over the Oregon Trail. From 1879-82 he served as Portland's Mayor. In 1900, Thompson's gift of this bronze elk sculpture was intended to commemorate elk that once grazed nearby. Roland Hinton Perry sculpted the elk.



Here's a 4 bus making its way by the elk without difficulty. Lots of days after work, I'm on that bus, lately only if I miss the Portland Streetcar outside my work building.



Other vehicles successfully pass the fountain, too.

Lownsdale Square, oh to able to stand in the park again

This photo was taken Oct. 16, 2007, as I stood in Lownsdale Square, looking south towards the Thompson Elk and Chapman Square. The TriMet bus heading west on SW Main hides the elk's legs as it makes the curve around the statue's base. You can tell how the ground rises as you walk west through the park. Today on the bus before and after work, I saw the fences around both parks. The only evidence I noticed of any restoration progress was the complete absence of lots of park benches. The original estimate I read in the Oregonian and posted on here on December 3 mentioned "Replace two park benches, repair seven benches: $16,500." It was not mentioned which park or if these benches were spread between both parks. The missing benches I noticed were all in Chapman Square. The bus stopped at the intersection is on SW 4th Avenue. At the time that this photo was taken, the downtown Transit Mall had been moved to SW 3rd and SW 4th while SW 5th and SW 6th underwent extensive renovation, part of which was the addition of the MAX Green Line.

Lownsdale Square, for the Eighth Floor of a Parking Garage

I took this photo on Feb. 25, 2010. Look at the street at the top of the photo. See the circle in the center of the street? The Thompson Elk is in there, behind the tree trunk.

Here's some info on the square, from the Internet: Lownsdale Square, SW 4th Ave. & Main St.
Historical Information

Lownsdale is one of two courthouse squares that comprise the Plaza Blocks which are bounded by Third and Fourth Avenues and Salmon and Madison Streets. The north square is named for Kentuckian Daniel H. Lownsdale, who settled in Portland in 1845 when there were fewer than 800 people living in the city. The south square is named for former Iowa territorial legislator and native Virginian William Williams Chapman (1808-1892) who arrived in Portland in 1850.

The Plaza Blocks were lively places where orators held forth and citizens assembled. They are characterized in part by several large old elms and gingko trees. Chapman Square, originally designed for the exclusive use of women and children, features all female gingko trees. Lownsdale Square was to be the "gentlemen's gathering place." Today the Plaza Blocks are still a busy gathering place, although men and women can now safely coexist in either of them.

In the center of Lownsdale Square stands the Soldiers' Monument, Douglas Tilden’s monument to the Oregonians killed in the Spanish-American War. Dedicated on May 31, 1906, the tall granite obelisk is topped with a bronze replica of an infantryman of the Second Oregon U.S. Volunteer Infantry, part of the first large American fighting force ever sent overseas. At the base of this monument are two small cannons from Fort Sumter (misspelled on the plaque) brought here by Colonel Henry E. Dosch. Because the cannons were used by both Union and Confederate troops, it was Dosch's idea to face one north and one south.

Another war memorial, dedicated to the men killed in service in the Philippines, is found in Lownsdale Square. Fountain for Company H, installed in 1914, was donated by the mothers, sisters, and wives of Company H of the Second Oregon Volunteers. John H. Beaver, an architectural draftsman, won the honor of designing the limestone fountain and a $50 prize in a citywide contest.

Between the two Plaza Blocks, Main Street curves around a huge elk fountain given to the city by David P. Thompson. Thompson arrived in Portland driving sheep over the Oregon Trail. He served as Portland's mayor from 1879-1882. One day looked out of the office window in his New Market Building at the Skidmore Fountain and decided that he wanted to dedicate a fountain to the city as well. Thompson commissioned Roland Hinton Perry, whose work adorns the Library of Congress and the dome of the Pennsylvania state capitol, and in 1900, he presented the city with a bronze elk fountain to commemorate elk that once grazed nearby. Local architect H.G. Wright designed the stone base of eastern granite, which included drinking troughs for horses and dogs. The Exalted Order of Elks refused to dedicate it because they considered the statue "a monstrosity of art." Many have tried to have Thompson's elk removed because it can be considered a traffic obstacle, but the elk statue remains. In 1974, after a debate about disturbing the blocks in order to complement the then-new General Services Building, Thompson's elk and the Plaza Blocks were designated as Historic Landmarks.

Leading up to ABC Wednesday: R is for round and in a row.

Barricades on SW 3rd Avenue, in front of the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse. This building is directly across the street from Lownsdale Square Park, the park that is north of the Thompson Elk Fountain.

He's back, framed more beautifully than ever.

It's not clear to me why I'm so taken with this elk statue. Could it be the strength the statue depicts? The sweep of the antlers? I just don't know, but I certainly have enjoyed taking photos of it. I took these on Oct. 30, and now two weeks later, almost all of the leaves have fallen to the ground. I hope it snows this winter, just enough to decorate the elk, not enough to paralyze the city since snow is not the norm here. I would love to see that!

In the first photo, you can see one TriMet bus at the corner of SW Main and 4th. In the second photo, you can see four buses on SW 3rd Avenue. Downtown Portland's mass transist system makes multiple stops on these two streets that run north (4th) and south (3rd). It's what's known as the temporary bus mall--the backbone that connects many bus lines so that folks can get from anywhere to anywhere in the metropolitan area, including Washington state. The original bus mall on 5th and 6th is being remodeled to add light rail from Portland State University in the south all the way to Union Station in the north. The construction work began last January, and as far as I can tell the temporary mall is working very well. The remodel is projected to be finished in January 2009. There will be a construction moratorium in downtown starting next Friday, through New Year's (I think) so that people can come shop and enjoy holiday activities downtown without the hassle of heavy equipment, barricades, etc. Does that sort of thing happen in your city?