State Highway Division Region 1 Office (Vacant) – Milwaukie OR

Description

The State Highway Division Region 1 Office, originally known as the State Highway Division Office and State Police Headquarters Building, was constructed in 1938 by Works Progress Administration (WPA) employees. The total cost of the building, landscaped grounds, and associated out-buildings was $118,287 with $78,541 provided by WPA funds and the remaining provided by the state.

The Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT) state office building sits adjacent to Pacific Highway 99E, Oregon’s first “superhighway.” This section of the roadway named McLoughlin Boulevard had only been operating for three years when the rustic style building opened its doors for use as the State Police and the State Highway Commission regional office. Together the superhighway and the new office complex represented progress and improvement in the landscape and in these state services. An October 1938 Oregonian article announced that twenty-two patrolmen and officers, moved from Portland and Oregon City offices to this point midway between the cities, would occupy the office space along with a similar number of State Highway Commission employees. In time, the State Highway employees took over the entire complex.

By 1995 when ODOT employees vacated the building, the residents referred to the ODOT Region 1 Office Building as the “Old Stone Building.” Its familiarity today makes it easy to overlook the fact that during the 1930s the State Highway Department, along with other state departments such as State Forestry and State Parks, selected a style inspired by rustic features associated with the National Park Service buildings.  Thus, buildings like the State Highway Division Region 1 Office influenced what would be a popular regional choice for such state service buildings in years to come.

While many of Oregon’s Works Progress Administration (WPA) constructed buildings were made of log, this administrative structure was made of stone similar to the New Deal funded Oregon State Forester’s Office in Salem completed the same year. There is some question as to whether this design was adapted from other WPA structures. The design drawings, however, are signed by Glen S. Paxson, the acting State Bridge Engineer at the time. The ODOT Cultural Property Inventory notes that the architectural engineers associated with the Bridge Section traditionally designed buildings for the State Highway Division.

WPA workers constructed the first floor of this one and a half story structure using stone quarried at Rocky Butte, a common source for the stone used in the region’s WPA-built tunnels, retaining wall and buildings. Other notable features of the building design include a decorative entrance way with a six-panel wood door, wrought iron brackets supporting the porch at the entrance, wood beams and rafters with carved ends, and shingle siding in the dormer walls.

While the building currently sits vacant, it is listed on the City of Milwaukie’s Historic Resource Property List. Given this acknowledgment of its significance in Milwaukie’s development history, planning review will be required of any future use of the structure.