Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives (June 14, 1909 – April 14, 1995)

Folk singer Burl Ives recorded "A Little Bitty Tear" (1961) and 
was responsible for Christmas standards like "Holly Jolly
Christmas” (1965). On a local note, Ives was the Grand
Marshal of the 1975 Portland Rose Festival Parade.

The public housing project Vanport was destroyed at 4:05 P.M. on Sunday
May 30,1948, when a 200-foot section of a dike holding back the Columbia
River collapsed during a flood, killing 15 people. Oregon’s second largest
city vanished in a day. The area is currently the site of Delta Park and the Portland International Raceway north of the city of Portland.

The city of Vanport in 1943

Richard Arvine Overton

(AP) – Born in Bastrop County, Texas, in 1906, by the time Richard 
Overton celebrated his 109th birthday on May 11 of this year, he had
already gotten used to his celebrity as America’s oldest living combat
veteran.

Having served in the Pacific theater during World War II from 1942 to
1945, Overton was part of the all-black 1887th Engineer Aviation
Battalion, fighting in places like Iwo Jima and Okinawa. He says 
while he saw his share of enemy fire, “I didn’t get a scratch.” He
left the service after attaining the rank of Sergeant. 

As an ambassador for the memory of those who served, Overton has
proven himself exemplary. In that role, the Austin, Texas, native has
been regularly praised by politicians of both parties, many of whom
have come to pay tribute to him and listen to his stories of war. 

When he was the Governor of Texas, Rick Perry (below) met with
Overton on Memorial Day in 2013. 

The mast of the battleship USS Oregon located in Tom McCall Waterfront
Park in Portland.