"Dikes are Safe at Present": The 1948 Columbia River Flood and the Destruction of Vanport

Snapshot of the campus in 1947, surrounded by staff and student parking.

A poster advertising the Vanport program to prospective students in 1946.

Informational brochure about admission to Vanport College.

Interior of above brochure with information about campus housing.

Article in the Oregon Journal, August 3, 1947, by Mona Albertson, on the Vanport Extension Center.

One of the benefits of student life at the Vanport Extension Center was affordable campus housing for students and their families, supplemented by a student-run co-op grocery, bookstore, and on-campus child care.  The character of the city of Vanport felt changes as the student population, primarily made up of military veterans and their families, grew, prompting the Oregon Journal headline in 1947, "There's Another Vanport."