The latest Library exhibit, opening May 31, 2017, presents a less-examined side of political debates and demonstrations during the Vietnam War era.

As United States military involvement in Vietnam escalated during the late 1960s, students at colleges and universities around the world mobilized against the war. From the Sorbonne in Paris to Kent State University in Ohio, campus life erupted in protest. Here at Portland State in 1970, students and faculty blockaded the South Park Blocks, demonstrating in opposition to the war, the military’s physical transport of nerve gas across Oregon, the Kent State killings, and the imprisonment of Black Panther leader Bobby Seale.

While the themes and images of those protests have become emblematic of that turbulent period, what is often overlooked is that new conservative movements rose up on campuses at the same time. In 1960, William F. Buckley Jr. and some of his contemporaries founded the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF). The group’s purpose was to promote conservative values in young people during a time of heavy political mobilization by the Left in the U.S. and abroad.

“Conservatism in a Revolutionary Era” takes its title from a manifesto of the YAF. The exhibit, curated by Honors student Mariah Denman, examines the reactions, rhetoric, and recruitment of this counter-counter-cultural student organization through its mission, publicity, and fundraising.

The Americanism Collection

The publications of the YAF are part of PSU Special Collections’ Charles M. White Americanism Collection, which contains materials related to or disseminated by American far Right conservative organizations from the 1950s through the early 1980s.

Dr. White, a long-time faculty member of Portland State’s Department of History, had focused his doctoral work on far Left movements in the United States.  As a counterbalance, he shifted his scholarly focus to the other end of the political spectrum. For over three decades, Dr. White and his students gathered, organized, and preserved materials from dozens of right-wing groups.

The resulting collection records a historical spectrum of the political Right in the United States, from policy-focused economic and social conservatism to more virulent perspectives that openly draw upon legacies of exclusion and discrimination.

“Conservatism in a Revolutionary Era” is on display in the Library first floor elevator lobby starting May 31, 2017. For more information, please contact Portland State University Library Special Collections.

An astronomical observatory on the roof of the Ondine?

An elementary school on campus?

A student-run television studio?

These are just a few of the Portland State projects that campus planners and architects envisioned, designed, and drew… but never built.

The “never-built environment” is a term for architectural design and urban planning projects that were either never constructed or were built in alternate or compromised states. Since its move to downtown Portland in 1952, the Portland State University campus has grown from a five-block area between Broadway and Park Avenue to over forty city blocks. The expanding university produced numerous plans and designs for new structures and landscapes–not all of which were realized. What might the campus have looked like, and what resources might it have offered, if these plans had come to be? In a new Library exhibit, PSU Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Archives present records of some of the university’s most surprising never-built projects.

The Ondine Observatory

Portland State’s plan to build an astronomical and seismic observatory in the 1960s was part of the college’s early effort to establish its reputation as a research institution. The college shelved the initial project, but did build both Science Building 1 and the Science Research and Teaching Center between 1965 and 1975.

PSU revived the dream of an on-campus observatory when faculty from the Chemistry and Physics departments, hoping to improve on-campus course offerings and research opportunities, proposed a domed telescope on the roof of the Ondine Residence Hall.

The cost of the equipment and its upkeep was daunting, however, and after delays from the dome’s manufacturer, expired building permits, and confusion about funding sources, the university closed the project in favor of two smaller and less expensive mobile telescopes mounted on the roof of Science 1.

Portland State Elementary School

The Student Housing and Elementary School (SHES) project began in the early 1990s in response to increasing need for on-campus child care and student housing. The multi-use SHES complex, located between SW Tenth and Twelfth Avenues, combined student apartments, retail, and an elementary school, with additional classrooms for use by Portland Public Schools and the PSU Graduate School of Education. The partner institutions suspended the project, however, after difficulties securing funding and determining which institution would pay for which features.

See More of PSU’s Past Future…

Other never-built Portland State projects include a television studio behind the Parkmill building, a pub in the Academic and Student Recreation Center, skybridges across the Park Blocks, a sports arena, and many, many parking garages.

Visit the “Never-Built Portland State” exhibit in the first floor lobby of the Library to see more of what was once planned for the Portland State campus!

Portland State University, founded as Vanport College in 1946, celebrates its 70th anniversary in 2016. This fall, University Archives presents the ultimate Portland State flashback: the complete collection of Viking yearbooks, from 1946 until 1995, can now be read online, searched, and downloaded from the PSU Library! Leaf through the digital yearbooks online, and visit PSU Archives’ Viking collection exhibit in the first floor elevator lobby of the Library!

Portland State students produced the Viking each year as an annual record of campus life, commemorating the highlights of each year in photographs, essays, articles, drawings, and poetry. Today the yearbooks are an invaluable and fun record of daily life at PSU, including academics, sports, politics, recreation, fashion, food, living on campus, and popular culture.

The publication began as a traditional school yearbook, with photographs of student groups, college-sponsored events, and portraits of the graduating class. In the 1950s and early 60s, Portland State students appeared in the Viking attending semi-formal dances and honoring their Homecoming royalty.

The yearbook’s format broke from collegiate tradition in the 1960s as PSU’s campus and culture diversified and expanded. The Viking‘s images and features show the campus as a busy and growing place during the late 1960s and early 1970s, a site of dialogue, performance, protest, and contemplation. The yearbook was a forum for student writing, occasionally with critical views, and always reflected the college’s deepening connection to the city.

The Viking suspended publication between 1978 and 1989, but resumed during the 1989-90 academic year and continued until 1995, concluding with Portland State’s 50th anniversary. During the 90s, PSU welcomed a new president and a new focus on undergraduate education that included the founding of our University Studies program. Like the earlier annuals from the 1960s, the 1990s annuals feature student groups, academic programs, campus resources, and events, with flashbacks to 1990s popular culture to set the scene.

Visit the Viking exhibit in the PSU Library first-floor elevator lobby this fall, read and download the yearbooks online, and see more about the digital yearbook collection in the PSU Magazine!