Welcome back to Thebeerchaser. If you are seeing this post through an e-mail, please visit the blog by clicking on the title at the top to see all of the photos so the narrative is not clipped or shortened. (External photo attribution at the end of the post #1)
At the end of April, we were delighted to have two separate house guests. Archie, our three-year old grand-pup, visited for ten days from Seattle while his family was on a Hawaiian vacation.
And my old consultant friend with whom I worked at the Schwabe law firm before I retired in 2011 – “West Coast” Dave Hicks – flew in from an east-coast business trip for two days before he returned home to Ventura, Ca.
In the early days of my Beerchasing hobby and over the next five years, Dave was a frequent companion as you can see from the photos below at the Double Barrel, Reel-Em Inn, the Horse Brass Pub, the Richmond Bar, Crackerjacks, Belmont Station and the Ranger Station.
Dave has used his Princeton and University of San Diego Law School education well and is now Chief of Staff at Garnett Capital Advisors – a financial services firm specializing in managing loan portfolio sales for credit-granting institutions.
He is also known to use his experience as a Princeton Nassoon – the university’s oldest acapella group – with his identical-twin brother, to entertain at parties although he refrained from doing this at the dive bars we visited.
We usually toasted one of my first and most memorable Beerchaser-of-the-Quarter, the late Dr. Harry Frankfurt – Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Princeton and author of the wonderful essay “On Bullshit.” (#2 – #4)
The Princeton Nassoons in 2008
Some Trepidation…?
Archie had visited and stayed overnight with us in the past, but it was always with his family – Mom and Dad and two young daughters.
Question No. 1: “How would he react to staying with us for ten days?”
Question No. 2: “How would he react to our male out-of-town visitor for a day and one-half? Did he have an aversion to the Ivy League?”
Well, our concerns were short-lived. Archie immediately went over to Dave sitting on the couch and curled up next to him and rolled over to have his stomach rubbed. Dave is a walker and the next day, he and I took Archie on a long walk on which Dave was the main leash holder. And the pup was a prince for his entire stay with us.
Trepidation unwarranted!
Beerchasing
Dave and I had an ambitious agenda. On the Friday afternoon, we drove the twenty-four miles to the Mount Angel Abbey to have some beers at the Benedictine Brewery and St Michael Taproom and say “hello” to Fr. Martin, the Manager and Head Brewer.
No brewery will ever surpass my affection for this enterprise on the grounds of the Abbey in Mount Angel Oregon – one of just three owned and operated by Benedictine monks in the US.
Those who follow this blog, may recall that I was involved in the planning and development of the Brewery starting in 2016 until it opened in late 2018 including the amazing event in 2017, when over 125 monks, priests, seminarians and volunteers and members of the Mount Angel community, gathered for an “old-fashioned barn rising.”
As shown in the videos in this post, we started with a cement slab that cloudy morning and by the end of the day, had a framed structure for the brewery and taproom. https://thebeerchaser.com/2017/11/21/the-benedictine-brewery-beam-me-up/ (#5 – #11)
Dave and I had a great sampler of six beers and toured the beautiful Abbey Hilltop including a visit to the famous Alvar Aalto Library before returning to our home in West Linn. (#12 – #13)
Dave had invited Janet and me to dinner the next evening at the Bellpine Restuarant at the top of the Ritz Carlton Hotel in downtown Portland. While Janet spent her Saturday afternoon on a variety of activities, Dave and I drove into Portland for beers at two of my favorite downtown dive bars.
The Yamhill Pub – as I stated in the title of my 2015 blog post https://thebeerchaser.com/2015/05/14/the-yamhill-pub-a-dive-bar-with-character-or-grunge/ the aura of this hole-in-the-wall was best described in the now defunct Portland Barfly Website (another COVID victim…)
“A genuine dive-bar lurking midst the downtown shopping arcade, the Yamhill Pub maintains an unreconstructed seediness through blaring juke, food…(and, for that matter, toilets) best avoided, actively-encouraged graffiti upon the smoke-stained walls, pennies-a-serving pitchers, and a fiercely-protective cadre of underemployed regulars (seniors, rockers, bike messengers) willing to throw themselves in front of Hummers to prevent the forces of gentrification. Intimidating for the first-time visitor, but that’s sort of the point.”
This was my fourth visit to the Yamhill, and I was happy to see that it was still in business. As one regular commented to me in 2015, “Mark my words, this place will be gone in five years and that will be a tragedy.”
Willamette Week reported in November 2020, that Kevin Hill, the owner, launched a $15,000 GoFundMe campaign to raise $15,000 to save the bar – evidently it worked.
But grunge is still the watchword – from the graffiti-infested walls, the bathrooms and even the entrance sign in which the name has become essentially illegible. Look at the difference in the sign over the front door between 2015 and last month!
But as stated in its own Wikipedia page and as affirmed by, Neal, our friendly bartender, the Yamhill Pub, founded in 1939, still retains its legacy for draft PBR. “The bar has been recognized as the top Pabst Blue Ribbon seller in Oregon.”
Not only that, but at one time in the ’90’s they were #5 in North America!! Before I could scoff, he pointed out this PBR sign (see below) from 2012 – Number 18 in North America in PBR sales.
Dave and I chatted with Neal about Portland bars and watched the The Other Guys – a “buddy-action-comedy” movie with Mark Wahlberg, Will Ferrell and Michael Keaton which was streaming on the of the two small screen TVs hanging at the corners of the bar. (It seemed appropriate given the setting.)
Kelly’s Olympian – We walked around Portland some more – noting how the City was coming back from the depths but still had a way to go – and I suggested we drop into another favorite dive. Kelly’s Olympian, which evolved even before the Yamill (in 1902 – the third oldest Portland bar in continuing operation) has class and a great theme as you will see from the pictures below and this description from their website:
“The crowning glory is the collection of a dozen vintage motorcycles hanging from the ceiling and about, each restored to perfection. One of the owners is a motorcycle enthusiast and finally found a home for his impressive motorcycle collection.
Complementing the motorcycles are other motorcycle accessories, combined with museum quality neon signs, antique gas pumps and historic photos of Portland and motorcycles.”
If you enjoy history, read the full account in my 2015 blog post. Even the name chronicles the legacy:
“The name was derived from the name of one of the original owners, ‘Kelly’, and the Olympia Brewing Company, which was involved in the inaugural opening so that it could sell its product, Olympia Beer. It was originally called ‘The Olympian Saloon’. The name ‘Kelly’s’ was added a few years later…..”
And part of the bar’s historic identity goes back even further. The sections of downtown Portland – mostly in Old Town Chinatown – were known for their “Shanghai Tunnels.” According to Wikipedia, this is really a misnomer, and an urban legend:
“They connected the basements of many hotels and taverns to the waterfront of the Willamette River. They were built to move goods from the ships docked on the Willamette to the basement storage areas, allowing businesses to avoid streetcar and train traffic on the streets when delivering their goods.”
I had seen some of these on a tour by Adam Milne, owner of Old Town Pizza and Brewing, below his establishment in Old Town (right three photos below), but behind the Kelly’s Olympian Bar is a stairway down to the basement (photo on the left).
In my 2015 first visit to the bar, Lucia, the Manager, verified that servers still descend the stairs through the trapdoor behind the bar to get ice and that’s where their kegs are also stored.
We left after Dave refused to believe my story that the 1912 Princeton Student Body President visiting Portland one summer, got drunk at Kelly’s and was last seen being shuttled to a Chinese freighter.
Bellpine at the Top of the Ritz Carlton – We headed to West Linn to pick up Janet and get into our fancier duds and then drove back into Portland where notwithstanding our offer to dine on pub food at a brewery, Dave treated us to a wonderful six-course dinner (plus dessert) at the Bellpine on the 35th floor of the Ritz.
“Led by acclaimed Executive Chef Pedro Almeida, the culinary journey features ingredients indigenous to the region and is accentuated with world-class wine selections and unique spirits crafted by the region’s master distillers.”
Although the opulent bar was sparsely occupied on a Saturday night, the restaurant was hopping and it was a wonderful meal (yes, I drank wine instead of a PBR) and a fitting farewell to Dave who flew out the next morning to his Ventura, Ca. home. (#14 – #16)
Final Note
I chuckled on the way back home about having a bit of culture shock based on our three establishments that day ending with Bellpine after Kelly’s Olympian and beginning at the Yamhill Pub. Perhaps it was tantamount to a high-rise outhouse…..
And unfortunately, the 2019 timing of the development of the Ritz, by noted Portland developer, Walt Bowen, was disastrous. A fascinating March 2025 Willamette Week article charts the history:
“After two huge wins, he was ready to gamble again. A new project, called Block 216, would be his most ambitious ever. It would have five floors of prime office space, a Ritz-Carlton hotel, and 132 Ritz-Carlton condominiums…
That may be the most ill-timed guarantee in the history of Portland real estate. A year later, the world locked down because of COVID-19. Hotels emptied. People fled urban condos for ranch houses in the suburbs…
It appears Bowen’s dream tower will instead be a 460-foot tombstone for his career. As first reported by WW on March 5, the construction lender for Block 216 said in an earnings report that ‘ownership and serial asset disposition on the components would be the best net present value outcome for the loan.’
Translation: take the keys and sell the building in pieces.” (#17)
Well at least Kelly’s and the Yamhill will still be serving good cheap beer!
External Photo Attribution
#1. Garnet Capital Website (https://www.garnetcapital.com/aboutus/management#1)
#2. Wikimedia Commons (File:2008NassoonsHolzhaus.jpg – Wikimedia Commons) Lhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en – Attribution: Nassoons at English Wikipedia – 5 July 2008.
#3. Public Domain – Wikimedia Commons (File:On Bullshit cover.jpeg – Wikimedia Commons) This image of simple geometry is ineligible for copyright and therefore in the public domain, because it consists entirely of information that is common property and contains no original authorship. Author: Dr. Harry Frankfurst, Princeton University Press – 2008.
#4. Wikimedia Commons (File:Harry Frankfurt at 2017 ACLS Annual Meeting.jpg – Wikimedia Commons) Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license. Author: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCN30Qk9j0bKuWF2ulC9CtVQ – 29 October 2018.
#5 – #11. Benedictine Brewery Website (https://www.benedictinebrewery.com/home-1).
#12 – #13. Mount Angel Abbey Website (https://www.mountangelabbey.org/).
#14 – #17. Wikimedia Commons (File:Portland, Oregon, May 2024 – 54.jpg – Wikimedia Commons) Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. Author: Another Believer – 19 May 2024. (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Another_Believer).
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