Webfoot Wednesday: Old MacDonald

There was a great article in the Oregonian this morning about a stolen, and then abandoned, goat on the lam in SE Portland... it had been taken from a fenced, vacant lot upon which a herd of goats had been released to act as natural lawn mowers. The Portland Police took the burglary call seriously, the goat was located and returned, and all is well. (Now, people, leave those poor goats alone!)

Anyway, this got me thinking about the stories my step-grandfather told about herding dairy cows through inner NE Portland during his childhood. The whole back-to-the-earth movement in these gentrifying parts of Portland, with all the urban farms and chickens and so on, is really just a reemergence of what used to exist in these parts of the city.

In honor of the rescued goat and all those original "urban" farmers, here are a few fun photos:


[Photo credit] George Schreiber family and friends at their farm in the Albina District, 1910s-1920s


[Photo credit] Another view of the Schreibers


[Photo credit] This photo is captioned "Street Scene on the Peninsula [N Portland], ca. 1900"