The community of Vanport was a public housing project once located between
the city of Portland, Oregon and the Columbia River, what is now the site of
Delta Park and the Portland International Raceway. Construction began in
August 1942 to house the workers at the wartime Kaiser Shipyards in Portland
and near-by Vancouver, Washington. It was home to 40,000 people, making it
Oregon’s second-largest city at the time, and the largest public housing project
in the nation.

The city was destroyed at 4:05 p.m. on May 30, 1948, when a 200-foot section 
of the dike holding back the Columbia River collapsed during a flood, killing
fifteen people. The city was underwater by nightfall leaving its inhabitants
homeless.