Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
As you come to the end of the bridge, turn right and descend the stairs
to rejoin the Waterfront Park path and return to your starting point.
BACK STORY: DR. JAMES C.
HAWTHORNE
If no one has yet written a historical novel about Hawthorne Boulevard's
namesake, it's high time: Dr. James Hawthorne seems like a figure ripe for
novelization, at least based on the bare factual outline of his life. A native of
Pennsylvania, Hawthorne (1819-1881) spent several years working in medi-
cine in California, where he was also elected to the state Senate. He moved to
Portland in 1857 to run a facility for the mentally ill, and then in 1862 he took
charge of the Oregon Hospital for the Insane, the state's first such institution
(it occupied 200 acres around the intersection of SE Hawthorne Boulevard
and 10th Avenue). Known as a caring, forward-thinking, and compassionate
man, Hawthorne ran the asylum until he died, at which point there were
somewhere around 500 inmates there. Hawthorne was married twice: his first
wife, Emily Curry, died just a few weeks after they were married. In 1865 he
married Mrs. E. C. Hite, from Sacramento, and they had three daughters, one
of whom died in infancy.
Dr. Hawthorne is buried in Lone Fir Cemetery (see Walk 15: Stark-Belmont ) ;
according to the cemetery's website, some 132 of his patients are also buried
there, though their graves are unmarked and the exact locations now uncer-
tain. The patients were buried in the same part of the cemetery that was used
for Portland's many Chinese workers during the 1890s, some of whom were
later disinterred and repatriated for permanent burial in China. Metro, the re-
gional government in charge of Lone Fir maintenance and operation, has
planned a memorial garden to commemorate the sad histories of the asylum
patients and the Chinese workers who were buried here. (For more about the
plan, visit Metro's website, tinyurl.com/lonefirmemorial . )
CONNECTING THE WALKS
Link with Walk 1: Old Town and Chinatown , Walk 12: Industrial Southeast , or Walk
14: Hawthorne Blvd . from various points along this route.
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