The Swordfish Don't Swim in Portland Anymore

I used to love Old Portland in the summer. My favorite thing about it was when the swordfish would swim up the Columbia and into the Willamette from their homes in the warmer waters of the Pacific. Old Portlanders will remember this happened only a few days every summer, but it would be quite a show. People would gather on the waterfront to watch the swordfish leap 20 or 30 feet in the air, fence with each other, commandeer boats from those brave enough or foolish enough to venture close, and crash them into bridges.

Marine biologists were at odds about what exactly caused the swordfish to pursue this annual behavior, though it seems to me it was for no reason in particular, that the swordfish just possessed the same degree of fondness for the city that we all did at the time.

Old Portlanders will remember one time when the swordfish took over a dinner cruise on the Portland Spirit. If memory serves, there was a wedding party aboard at the time. The bride was in her 50s and on her second marriage; the groom was 70 and hoping for better luck on his fourth or fifth. The swordfish gathered the frightened celebrants in the ballroom, and just when things might have started getting ugly, a quick-thinking porter whistled at the gang of swordfish to get their attention, and then began throwing salmon fillets overboard. The swordfish followed the salmon back into the water and presumably enjoyed quite a feast.

They kept coming for a few years every summer after that, but gradually their numbers began to taper off. Marine biologists were puzzled as to why they stopped coming, but longtime Portlanders understood and recognized that, sadly, this phenomenon could never happen in New Portland.

Dr. Mitchell Millar is president of the Olde Portland Preservation Society, and leads semi-regular tours of the Willamette aboard the good ship Portland Spirit, which, when not encumbered by flotillas of pleasure boats, makes good speed to the great falls in Oregon City and back, while he regales newcomers with stories about how great the city once was and when it began its decline. To book passage on an upcoming tour go to merctickets.com and use the coupon code LiferBoat.

Willamette Week