You Will be Warned if Necessary
In 1948 the ship-building company town of Vanport, Oregon, just north of Portland, was destroyed by the overflowing banks of the Columbia River. Vanport's residents, home to the city's sequestered African-American population, were uprooted. This walk/drawing traces the 9 miles that some of the African-American residents took into a city that was, previously, off-limits. For many, this migration ended at the Williams Street YMCA and laid the groundwork for the first African-American neighborhood within the city limits.
