By Patricia Filip

Mike and Brian McMenamin (left to right) at the White Eagle, a North Portland landmark acquired by McMenamins in 1998.

The three artists and the historian on staff are a dead give away. McMenamins is not your typical pub chain. And the jean clad, down-home McMenamin brothers are not your run-of-the-mill corporate executives.

The enterprising OSU alumni, Brian and Mike McMenamin, oversee a mushrooming chain of 50 establishments — brew pubs, theater pubs, lodging and conference facilities, and destination resorts.

What really sets the McMenamins apart, however, is their knack for seeing beyond hops and malt, stout and ale. Beyond the abandoned poor farm, the boarded-up grade school, the 19th century farmstead and the faded dowager of a ballroom in downtown Portland.

With a keen interest in history and a passion for preservation, they have poured millions of dollars into resurrecting and renovating historic properties. In the process, they are revitalizing sleepy small towns and aging neighborhoods.
Take Edgefield, for example.

Troutdale Mayor Paul Thalofer recalls back to 1990, when Multnomah County wanted to raze the old Edgefield Center nursing home to make way for perhaps a big-box retail development or a county jail. Edgefield was originally built as a county poor farm in 1911 and during the Depression housed more than 600 indigent residents. It later became a county nursing home. After being abandoned in 1982, youth gangs and vagrants haunted its darkened halls.

The Troutdale Historical Society fought the county and city of Troutdale for five years to prevent the demolition. Thalofer said the Troutdale City Council finally gave Edgefield a year’s reprieve — and the McMenamins stepped in. As Thalofer said, "they turned a sow’s ear into a silk purse."

McMenamins bought the buildings and initial acreage for $500,000 and with the infusion of millions of dollars of additional capital turned the property into a destination resort that now includes 38 acres, restaurants, brew pub, winery, theater, bed and breakfast rooms, conference center, distillery and golf course.

"It’s become the crown jewel of east Multnomah County and certainly Troutdale," said Thalofer. "We really owe the McMenamins a large debt of gratitude for coming to the rescue. Troutdale’s doing really well, and McMenamins played a big part in the revival of Troutdale business."

When Mike and Brian attended OSU, they certainly didn’t have this kind of empire-building in their career plans. Mike, who played football his freshman year, graduated in 1974 with a degree in political science.

The renovation of the Old Oregon Hotel has had spurred development in downtown McMinnville.

"Looking back I should have taken totally different things," he said. "I was not smart enough to figure out what I actually liked. Now it’s art, design, history and architecture."

Brian, too, majored in political science, graduating in 1980. His interests are more business oriented: "legal, administrative, human resources, all the things that come with managing people."

Although Mike had many odd jobs growing up, he landed the first job he liked and got the "restaurant bug" at Togo’s sandwich shop on Monroe Street in Corvallis.

After graduation, while working at a produce warehouse in Southeast Portland, Mike spotted a cafe for sale across the street. He and two friends bought it, added beer and served Togos-type food.

They later sold what had become Produce Row Cafe. Other ventures followed, including a failed attempt at running a beer distributorship. Then in 1983, Mike and Brian launched the Barley Mill Pub in Southeast Portland, the first of the McMenamins chain of establishments. In 1985, they opened the first brew pub in Oregon since prohibition at the Hillsdale Brewery and Public House.

Two years later, they converted a former 1890s Swedish Tabernacle in Northwest Portland into Portland’s first theater-pub, the Mission Theater and Pub. They went on to save the art deco Bagdad Theater in Southeast Portland from the wrecking ball, renovating it into another theater-pub by removing every other row of seats and installing tables.

"Everyone was surprised I think that we could serve beer at a movie theater," said Brian. "I look at it the other way, the other side of the coin. That is we have a pub showing movies."

In 1986, the McMenamins leased a pioneer farmhouse in Hillsboro, which had housed six generations of the Imbrie family, and opened the Cornelius Pass Roadhouse. The farmstead included some of the state’s oldest standing farm buildings (a granary dating to 1855, the farmhouse constructed in 1866, and a rare, octagonal barn built in 1913). When developers proposed to tear down the octagonal barn and some of the farm buildings to build an Execulodge motel, preservationists crawled out of the woodwork to block the project. The McMenamins came forward and purchased the lease.

The stairway leading to the upstairs guest rooms of the White Eagle saloon.

Now the Imbrie farmstead sits like an oasis amid burgeoning new development in the Sunset corridor.

Instead of being razed to make way for a motel, the barn and granary have been turned into meeting rooms and the milking shed into a small pub. Generations-old orchards remain as does an old grapevine that produces grapes added to the brews. Imbrie Hall, the newest addition to the property, includes materials salvaged from old buildings including rafters from Portland’s Blitz-Weinhard brewery.

And then there is Portland’s legendary Crystal Ballroom. As Mike said, "It’s one of the greatest spaces on the planet."

The ballroom’s famous floating dance floor, suspended by rocker arms and bearings, is purportedly one of three built in the country and the only one still intact. Perhaps more memorable than the bouncing floor and ornate plaster trim are the personalities, music and dancing that had filled the space over the decades.

Built in 1913, it was first operated by Montrose Ringler as the Cotillian Hall and then used over the years for Dad Watson’s old time dance revivals, Gypsy ceremonies, and soul music concerts by celebrated performers James Brown, Marvin Gaye, and Ike and Tina Turner. In 1967 it achieved legendary local notoriety as "Portland’s psychedelic palace," hosting light shows and big-name rock bands.

In 1968, the City of Portland forced closure of the Crystal Ballroom, prompted by concerns about building code deficiencies as well as the ballroom’s reputation as a hippie enclave.

The Rock Creek Tavern features a turn of the century bar.

For nearly 30 years, the floating floor was still and the space silent. Then in 1995, the McMenamins rescued it, spending what Brian estimates at between $3 and $4 million to restore it.

"The problem is you go in there and get a bid to do the project, but then when you get into it there are always surprises," he said. "The building required a massive amount of work — new plumbing, electrical, seismic upgrade, new roof."

Mike admits that with its capacity for more than 1,000 people, keeping the Crystal Ballroom full is a challenge. "That’s as big a challenge as we’ll have," he said. "But it’s a worthy opponent."

Another hefty challenge for the McMenamins was the Kennedy School. At a time when many businesses were leaving inner-city America, the McMenamins boldly decided to transform a boarded-up elementary school in Northeast Portland into an entertainment, bed and breakfast, and conference facility.

The Italian villa styled school opened in 1915 and was abandoned by the Portland School District in 1980. For the next 15 years, the Kennedy School’s alumni and neighbors fought to prevent the school’s demolition. The city of Portland took possession of the property and then sold it to the McMenamins for its assessed value, allowing them to pay off the debt over 15 years by allowing community use of the facilities, such as meeting spaces, gym, soaking pool and community garden.

"Integrating the community into what we’re trying to do in that particular instance worked great. The neighborhood is a real strong supporter of the project," Brian said.

"It really works because people come here and use this facility," Mike said. "It became a community center. It’s pretty powerful."

From classrooms, the McMenamins have carved 35 hotel rooms, complete with original chalkboards and cloak closets. The former pink tiled girl’s restroom has been transformed into the brewery, the gymnasium into a movie theater, and another room into the "Detention Bar."

Though the building has been preserved, its current use might not have passed muster with the school’s first principal, Mina Parsons, who was a champion of women’s rights as well as the temperance movement.

	Top: The Rock Creek Tavern in Hillsboro stands on the site of a stage stop on the old overland route from Portland to the coast. Left: Ceramic art decorates the grounds of the McMenamins Grand Lodge in Forest Grove.
	The Grand Lodge auditorium has hosted events ranging from Christmas pageants to Maypole dances.

The same vision that prompted the McMenamins to find new uses for an old school drew them to McMinnville, where they joined with the Old Oregon Hotel Partnership to renovate the Old Oregon Hotel.

The four-story hotel, built in 1905, is the tallest commercial building in Yamhill County. When Mike and Brian first stood on the roof of the old hotel, they were dazzled by the panoramic view. Although they already had decided to restore the faded building, the view convinced them to install a rooftop bar.

"On a sunny day you can’t believe the view," said Mike. "You can see all the way over McMinnville ... rolling hills, vineyards, church steeples. It’s really beautiful."

Brian said the hotel required a total renovation. The upper three floors of the hotel had been vacant for decades. The fourth floor in fact had never been finished.

Jeb Bladine, publisher of the McMinnville News-Register, said the McMenamins put into service a great old building and solidified downtown McMinnville’s place as a real destination spot.

"This kind of commitment sparks confidence, has a positive economic impact and takes the downtown to another level as a full-service area," he said. "Their competitors have done progressively better, and visitors come downtown because McMenamins has a name."

Patti Webb, McMinnville Downtown Association manager, said that the hotel inspired the renovation of another hotel across the street. She said that McMenamins have been a big player in downtown promotions, sponsoring concerts and other events.

North of McMinnville in Forest Grove, sits the McMenamins’ newest large-scale project — the sprawling Grand Lodge. The lodge, a former Masonic and Eastern Star retirement home and grand lodge, opened in 2000. The 13-acre pastoral site includes bed and breakfast rooms, multiple pubs, a brewery, meeting rooms, theater and outdoor gardens.

Ray Giansante, manager of the Forest Grove Chamber of Commerce, said McMenamins draws more visitors to town.

He recalls his role in luring McMenamins to Forest Grove. Several years ago, while he and the mayor were driving by the retirement home on their way to a meeting, the mayor said, "You know that’s for sale."

At that time a local supermarket wanted to buy it, tear it down and build a strip mall.

"It just popped into my mind," Giansante said, "that’s the Edgefield on this side of Portland." He put in a call to the McMenamins asking them to take a look at the building.

Mike McMenamin hopped in his Blazer, headed west for a look, but couldn’t find the building at first. When he finally happened upon it, he was left in a complete state of disbelief.

"This couldn’t be it!" he wrote in the company newsletter. "It was one of the biggest surprises in our company’s 25-year history."

"It’s always an adventure when a new potential project rears its head," he said. "You never know what you’ll find or what mysterious forces might take control of your sense and shake you like a puppet. The lightening can strike at any time. It could be something that you drive by on the way to see something else ... And when a building begins to have a conversation with you, it’s only a matter of time."

Part of having the conversation involves listening to the building’s history. That is accomplished with the help of staff historian Tim Hills.

"He dives into the history of the place and then meets with artists and translates history into words for artists and then they can start putting together what they want to do art-wise," said Brian. "Art tells the story of the area and the people who live there and bring it to life."

McMenamins has three artists on staff and has commissioned scores of others to create artwork. At the Grand Lodge, for example, artists have painted former retirement home residents, orphans who co-inhabited the home during its early years, Latino residents of Forest Grove and fur trappers who first settled the area.

Although the McMenamins started out buying older buildings because they were less expensive, they’re now drawn to them because of their rich history.

"Older buildings invite the public into the buildings," said Brian. "Our early successes allowed us to pursue our dream of getting the older buildings up and running."

"From a penciling-out standpoint, they just don’t make sense," said Mike. "That’s why a lot of them languish. From an economic standpoint, they’re hard to make work. If you can kind of close your eyes to that, which we’re prone to do, it comes down to the long-term sort of thing. What you get out of it is way more than the monetary rewards.

"When you’re young you’re more interested in trying to make money. After a while, you figure out what’s real."

Ed Lawrence, manager of the Crystal Ballroom, agrees that the McMenamins have a talent for finding special properties. Lawrence, a 1968 graduate of OSU, recalls that there were about 100 employees when he began working for McMenamins 12 years ago. Like most other McMenamins managers, he began his career serving beer. Now the company estimates the number of full and part-time employees at about 1,500.

With that many employees and an empire stretching from north of Seattle to Roseburg, one would think the McMenamins might be tempted to hunker down. Brian and Mike admit that with more work to be done on existing sites, they may be slowing a bit in acquiring new properties.

But then again, they say that they’re looking into a project in Bend — a Catholic grade school, which would be developed somewhat like the Kennedy School.

"We want to do more up in Washington, too," said Brian. "We just haven’t had time."

As for any talk of retirement, Mike scoffs. "I don’t know why I should. I work with fantastic people. I do the stuff I love to do. There’s music, there’s art, there’s history. There are old buildings, gardens and golf. That’s all pretty fun stuff in my book."

And, he adds, "You always have to have something you’re chasing."