Oregon Historical Society Hosts This Is Vietnamese Portland Exhibit, Curated By Lewis & Clark Staff And Students -04/21/25

The 15-panel traveling exhibit will be displayed at Oregon Historical Society’s Patricia Reser and William Westphal Pavilion from April 28 through April 30 and highlighted at a free public event on April 30 at 6:00 pm, “50 Years of Vietnamese Contributions to Oregon.” 

 

Portland, OR — The Oregon Historical Society (OHS) is hosting This is Vietnamese Portland, a 15-panel traveling exhibit highlighting stories from the Vietnamese Portland: Memory, History, Community archive housed at Lewis & Clark College’s Watzek Library. The bilingual (English and Vietnamese) exhibit will be on display at OHS’ Patricia Reser and William Westphal Pavilion from April 28 through April 30 for all to see without museum admission. OHS is also hosting an event on April 30 at 6pm that highlights the art of Lê Quang Vinh called 50 Years of Vietnamese Contributions to Oregon. This free public event features community leaders Paul Vu and Representative Thuy Tran, as well as Zoë Maughan BA ‘19, who works in special collections at Watzek and is the project manager of Vietnamese Portland.

 

“The war in Vietnam deeply affected the lives not only of Vietnamese people but also of many Americans who served in the military during that time, and of their loved ones,” said Kerry Tymchuk, OHS Boyle Family Executive Director. “Like all history, the story of how the war in Vietnam shaped the lives of Oregonians cannot be contained in a single point of view. This program’s focus is on a few of those points of view — Vietnamese Oregonians who have shaped the state during the 50 years since the end of the war — and OHS remains committed to sharing these as well as other perspectives on this history, across formats, in the future.”  

 

One of the goals of Vietnamese Portland, an archive housed as a special collection at Watzek Library at Lewis & Clark, is to make that impact visible. The multi-year oral history project, now in its eighth year, seeks “to document the history and experiences of Vietnamese Portlanders.” While it includes documents, photographs, and other archival materials, it is mostly made up of oral histories of Vietnamese Portlanders telling their stories in their own words. There are now more than 130 interviews that make up the archive.

 

“Pursuing my Master of Library and Information Science degree led me to an interest in archival silence, and what does it mean to look at our collections and see what's missing, and how do we kind of fill in those gaps?” said Maughan. “What I love about the Vietnamese Portland project is that it’s a very active project. It’s distinct in that it’s an ongoing living archive. A lot of the work I do is to find ways to bring archives like this into nontraditional archival places like community centers.”

 

While many Lewis & Clark students have worked on the project over the years, the two current student archive assistants, Nhân Hàn ‘27 and Thoan Nguyễn ’27, have curated the traveling exhibit which features oral histories highlighting Vietnamese contributions to Portland. The exhibit was initially created to tour Multnomah County libraries. It now has expanded to include Washington County libraries and specific events like a three-part series hosted by the Vietnamese Cultural Arts Alliance. 

 

Working on the exhibit has been a transformative experience for both Hàn and Nguyễn.

 

“It’s not just about the history, but it’s also about representation of all the voices and communities that have been left out of the stories,” says Hàn, who came to Lewis & Clark in 2023 from Ho Chi Minh City, and is studying economics and entrepreneurship.  

 

This past year, Hàn and Nguyễn have worked to identify the stories that exemplify three main themes that have emerged over the years: entrepreneurship, creativity, and community leadership. 

 

“I was born in Vietnam,” says Nguyễn, who is studying mathematics, economics, and computer science. “But I came here and got to know the Vietnamese Portland project, and I felt like ‘Oh, the history that I learned in Vietnam is just one perspective.’ Hearing people’s stories broadened my perspective.”

 

“The Vietnamese Portland project grew out of a desire by Watzek collections staff to broaden the stories of people told both at Watzek and in Oregon more generally,” said Maughan.

 

“We have the resources and knowledge at our disposal to get the grant funding that kicked off the project,” said Maughan. “We recognized there was a major need for Portland's greater history to reflect the impact of the Vietnamese population.”
 

Maughan and her colleagues are sensitive to the fact that the history belongs to the Vietnamese community. They always work in close collaboration with community partners, such as Vietnamese Community of Oregon, Asian and Pacific American Network of Oregon, Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization, Vietnamese Senior Association of Oregon, Hội Phụ Huynh, and Vietnamese Cultural Arts Alliance to ensure that the Vietnamese community of Portland is benefiting from the archive and that the archive is a collaborative project with the community.

 

The eight-panel English-only version will be on display in the Watzek Atrium from April 28 to May 12.

Oregon Historical Society Hosts Portland Premiere Of The 2025–2026 Oregon Blue Book On Friday, April 18 (Photo) -04/16/25

Portland, OR — Join Oregon Secretary of State Tobias Read in conversation with OHS Boyle Family Executive Director Kerry Tymchuk on Friday, April 18 at 12pm at the Oregon Historical Society as he shares highlights from the 2025–2026 edition of the Oregon Blue Book. Attendees will have the opportunity to purchase the first copies available for sale in Portland, and a collection of past Oregon Blue Books will also be on display.’’

 

Oregon law requires the Secretary of State to publish the Oregon Blue Book “biennially on or about February 15 of the same year as the regular session of the Legislative Assembly.” Each edition features beautiful cover images of Oregon captured by the winners of the Oregon Blue Book Cover Photo Contest. The 2025–2026 Oregon Blue Book front cover features a stunning capture from the Painted Cove in the Painted Hills Unit of the John Day Fossil Beds National Monument, near Mitchell. Photographer Matt Straite of Keizer made the image which he titled, “The Many Sides of Oregon.” The back cover includes an amazing astrophotography shot titled “Comet/C2023 A” by Nathan Rohde of Shady Cove.

 

Secretary of State Ben Olcott published the first edition in 1911 in response to an “increased demand for information of a general character concerning Oregon,” and it ran 131 pages. As Oregon has grown and expanded, so, too, has the Oregon Blue Book, with the 2023–2024 edition clocking in at 415 pages. 

 

Contained in the pages you can find almost anything you would want to know about Oregon, ranging from the population of each of Oregon’s cities and counties to the names and addresses of state officials, state agencies, and commissions. For history buffs, the Oregon Blue Book also includes an essay and timeline summarizing Oregon’s complex history as well as the text of the Oregon State Constitution. 

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About the Oregon Historical Society

For more than 125 years, the Oregon Historical Society has served as the state’s collective memory, preserving a vast collection of objects, photographs, maps, manuscript materials, books, films, and oral histories. Our research library, museum, digital platforms, educational programming, and historical journal make Oregon’s history open and accessible to all. We exist because history is powerful, and because a history as deep and complex as Oregon’s cannot be contained within a single story or point of view.

America 250 Oregon Commission Encourages Participation In Two Lights For Tomorrow -04/15/25

Portland, OR — On the night of April 18, 1775, Paul Revere, William Dawes, and others rode to Lexington, Massachusetts, warning minutemen and households about the approach of British forces. Behind him, lanterns in the steeple of the Old North Church were shining the agreed upon code made famous by poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, “One if by land, and two if by sea.” The next day, April 19, were the battles of Lexington and Concord — and the colonists were well prepared.

 

As part of the nationwide commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the America 250 Oregon Commission joins semiquincentennial commissions across the country in Two Lights for Tomorrow, a multi-state initiative that reminds citizens everywhere that our shared history is grounded in coming together to build a more perfect union.

 

Oregonians are called to participate by shining two lights on April 18, 2025, in their homes and community spaces.

 

“The America 250 Oregon Commission hopes that communities across the state will join us in Two Lights for Tomorrow to kick off the semiquincentennial commemorations,” said Kerry Tymchuk, Executive Director of the Oregon Historical Society and Chairman of the America 250 Oregon Commission. “Any kind of light can be used in any size building, be it a home, office, museum, community center, or government building. Using the imagery of shining lights as a uniting call to action, Two Lights for Tomorrow reminds us of the importance of working together for a promising future.”

 

If you or your organization is interested in getting involved with the America 250 Oregon commemoration, please contact oregon.250@ohs.org or sign up for the official America 250 Oregon email list.

About the America 250 Oregon Commission

 

The mission of the America 250 Oregon Commission is to coordinate, provide guidance, and ensure that Oregon’s official observance of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States is inclusive and shares the histories of Oregon’s diverse populations, including the histories of the Indigenous peoples who have resided here since time immemorial. Learn more at oregon250.org.