Tour Guide

WALKING TOUR OF 3015 SE 65TH

Be outside by 10:45. Bring handouts, hand microphone, jar.

OK, Hello, Welcome everyone. It’s 11 O’clock and I’ve counted nine people here. That’s the number I see signed up for today’s tour today of the basement of 3015 SE 65th Street, so we might as well get started. My name is Brian Runyan and I’ll be your tour guide today. Just a little quick housekeeping: as was noted on the website. This is a “dry” tour meaning there is no access to water for the duration of the tour. There are no drinking fountains nor bottled water so even though you were advised to bring your own personal water bottles be aware there are no restroom facilities so imbibe at your own risk. We will be entering the current occupants’ home and even though they are not in residence at the moment, there is no access to the upstairs portion of the home. So, before we begin our basement tour, are there any questions?

No, no ma’am. No Porta Potties. If anyone has personal plumbing issues that cannot tolerate a half-hour wait I encourage you to not begin the tour. Revisit the website and either request a refund or reschedule for another date. Any other questions? Good. Let’s get started.

As I mentioned, my name is Brian Runyan. I grew up in this house from 1951 to 1964. It was built in 1949 as part of the rush to provide housing for returning GIs and their growing families. My parents, Chester and Aileen Runyan were the second owners, purchasing it in 1951 after Chet secured his first steady, post-WWII employment with the Portland Fire Department. They had one son, me, who had just turned four. It is just over 700 square feet with two bedrooms and one bath, a kitchen, a living room and a full basement which will be the focus of our time together today.

As we walk up the driveway, you’ll notice we are approaching a rather large garage structure. It was built by my father in 1952 with my help and a few fellow firemen, too. They placed the cinder block foundation, erected the walls and poured the concrete floor and driveway. It is approximately 20’ x 30’ and in addition to space to park cars it contains an enclosed craft space in the rear and a small tool shed accessed from the side yard. Over the years it housed a black 1929 Willys Knight, a black 1932 Chevrolet coupe, a green 1950 Mercury and a red 1959 Rambler station wagon. The traces of blue paint still faintly visible on the floor stand as witness to an attempt to paint the Chevy utilizing the exhaust port of a TriStar canister vacuum cleaner.The flat roof was the perfect place from which to ogle a sunbathing Mrs. Beesom.

OK, everyone. As we prepare to enter the house, please grip the hand railings as we descend. Once we’re all inside we’ll pause briefly on the stairs. OK, we’re walking, now.

Alright, everyone in? Good!

When we moved in, the basement was completely unfinished, just one big room.

Daddy, initially enclosed this stairway and installed the dual handrails. The wall to your left continues down the center of the room to enclose the oil furnace and daddy’s work shop. Daddy’s workshop was always locked but never very well.

Hold the railings and come the rest of the way down the stairs.

Let’s all gather here in the center. The area directly to your right was then, as it is now, the laundry center. For the first six months the washer was an old wringer tub type. Clothes were dried on a square clothes pole outside, weather permitting, or hung on lines strung the length. Daddy kept a record for how long a load took to dry here in the basement and as soon as the budget would allow, a modern washer and an electric tumble drier were purchased. Looking up you can just make out the now blocked off laundry chute.

Once the drying lines were removed the space began its life as the home’s recreational hub. Daddy built a ping pong table out of plywood, painted it green and edged it in white. White balls, rubber faced paddles, and a green net created quite the pleasant space. Although it is a basement, the four window wells provided a surprising amount of light, supplemented by the still existent single bulb fixture.

Notice the wall to your left. Green seemed to be the going theme. The nature scenes you see on the wall are actually promotional placemats acquired from Chevron gas stations. The public was encouraged to “See the USA in your Chevrolet”. The placemats featured destinations like this one depicting a cactus in the Arizona desert, or this one of Multnomah Falls. All places requiring a car and gasoline to reach. Daddy collected all six placemats in the set and then shellacked them right on. They’ve held up pretty well, don’t you think? Not sure if all those places were visited or not. On the occasions when there were no ping pong opponents available, I could push the table right up to the wall and play solitaire ping pong. The ball returned pretty quickly improving my reflexes.

Sometime around 1956 things got a little crowded down here. A piano was added. Mama was an accomplished pianist. She and her sisters were trained by their musically degreed mother from the time they could sit a piano bench. At their earliest possible age, they were trotted out to perform for the society matrons of Portland. No records exist as to what songs were performed, but your handout lists many mentions from the society page of the Oregonian.

Mama was also an amazing transcriptionist. During her time in the Coast Guard, she could accurately type 100 words per minute on a manual typewriter. With the advent of the electric typewriter, she easily exceeded even that. She was employed by Bradley Pie Company as an executive secretary for many years which is where my love for boysenberry pies was born. Unfortunately, the years of pounding typewriter keys took a toll on her hands. Arthritic joints diminished her ability to enjoy playing the piano. It became a sad reminder of what she could no longer do, and the decision was made to remove the piano from its place of pride in the living room. Somehow, Daddy and friends got it down the stairs but I’m pretty sure the handrails had to come off for that move.

If you’ll all turn around and direct your attention to the other end of the space. This was my “play” room. It has been refurnished to replicate the time. The ratty green couch click-opened into a bed. This round three-legged table Daddy built. It served as the base for anything requiring a horizontal surface. Card games, the record player but it most often supported the carom board. This, as you can see, was a 30” rounded square board with a net pocket in each corner. The object was to finger-flick a white ring into the colored wooden rings, propelling them into the corner pockets. Sort of like cue-less pool. A lesser fun game was to aim for your opponent’s finger, draped tantalizingly against the railing on the opposite side of the board. Flip it over and there is a checkerboard for checkers or chess and markings for backgammon. I spent hours upon hours in my cave.

Around 1956; Well, it’s one, two, three o’clock four o’clock rock. Bill Haley and the Comets. Elvis with his Blue Suede Shoes and Fats Domino finding his thrill finally gave us our own music. The record player on the table wore out copies of Paul Anka and the Everly Brothers and who knows how many ‘45s. The first movie I ever went to without my parents was Rock Around the Clock. My older neighbor, Phil O’Brien and I walked the mile to the Ames theater on Foster Road to take it all in. I began to feel the pull of grown-upness.

The basement as my place of comfort and retreat ended in 1958. Mama was diagnosed, mastectomied, radiated and given a five-year lease on life. When the music died in February 1959 I kept playing the Surfaris and Jan and Dean down here but only when it was absolutely too nasty to be outside. Mama finally died in October of ’62 and my whole world opened up. I fully embraced the surf/skateboard craze and the basement no longer held any allure. Just as well. Daddy remarried and we moved to a new house. It had a basement. Daddy put up plywood walls, enclosed the ping-pong table, put his work bench in one corner and built me a study nook in another but, somehow, it just wasn’t the same.

This concludes the regular portion of our tour. I have received some feedback that the tour seems to come to a rather abrupt end. For that I apologize. It does however accurately reflect the sudden end of my childhood in 1962. Check out my website, www.bammer.com for other group tours showcasing equally fascinating aspects of my life.

Are there any questions? Yes, in the blue.

“What’s with the grass curtains on the window?”

I went through a brief phase where anything island-like, you know, Hawaii, Polynesia, was way cool. A few of us from school even started our own club, “The Islanders”. We all wore tiki necklaces. I decided the place needed to be more tropical so I gathered up a bunch of tall grasses from the neighborhood vacant lots and stitched the stalks together into a hanging curtain. Pretty cool, huh!

Yes, in the plaid.

“What’s your favorite memory from down here?”

Well, I remember being down here and feeling an earthquake sometime in the 60’s. That was pretty exciting.

I do remember Mama had perfect pitch and I could sit at the piano down here, plunk a key and she could tell me the correct note every time.

Thanks everyone for spending time with me today. Check out my website for other tours and don’t ignore the tip jar at the top of the stairs.

Sweep the premises for stragglers, litter. Turn off lights. Jar. Lock door.