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Inventory Form
NR Nomination

LOCATION AND PROPERTY NAME
address:421 SE 10th Ave historic name:Postal Employees Credit Union
Portland, Multnomah County current/other names:Postal Employees Credit Union Offices
assoc addresses:
block/lot/tax lot:
location descr: twnshp/rng/sect/qtr sect:1N 1E 35
PROPERTY CHARACTERISTICS
resource type:Building height (stories):2.0 total elig resources:1 total inelig resources:0
elig evaluation: eligible/significant NR Status: Individually Listed
prim constr date:1962 second date: date indiv listed:10/26/2020
primary orig use: Financial Institute orig use comments:
second orig use: Business
primary style: Modern Period: Other prim style comments:
secondary style: International sec style comments:
primary siding: Concrete: Other/Undefined siding comments:
secondary siding: Vertical Board
plan type: architect:John W. Reese and Frank E. Blachly
builder:Barnard & Kinney Company
comments/notes:
GROUPINGS / ASSOCIATIONS
Not associated with any surveys or groupings.
SHPO INFORMATION FOR THIS PROPERTY
NR date listed: 10/26/2020
ILS survey date:
RLS survey date:
Special Assessment
Status Term End Yr
Active 1st  2029
Federal Tax Program
Status Start Compl
Complete 06/15/2019  2020
106 Project(s): None
ARCHITECTURAL / PROPERTY DESCRIPTION
(Includes expanded description of the building/property, setting, significant landscape features, outbuildings and alterations)
Constructed in 1962, the Postal Employees Credit Union building is located at the southwest corner of SE 10th Avenue and SE Stark Street in Portland’s Buckman Neighborhood. The surrounding buildings are commercial and industrial. The one-story, 5,857-square-foot credit union was designed in the International Style with elements of the Northwest Regional style found at the interior. The main floor is supported by concrete pilotis, allowing parking under the building. The wood-frame building sits on a concrete slab and features an H-shaped plan. The building features vertical wood siding, stucco, and scalloped anodized aluminum shade screens. It has a flat roof with a metal parapet guardrail. The character-defining features of the exterior include the light monitor with a wave-shaped roof and colored glazing, the pilotis with below-grade parking, the flat roof and H-shaped plan, the metal screens, outdoor courtyard, rock-faced retaining walls, and cantilevered concrete steps adjacent to the building’s north side. On the interior, the character-defining features include the H-shaped floorplan with open banking room at the location of the light monitor; the exposed, S-shaped glulam beams and decking at the curved roof; concrete staircases; gumwood doors, “transoms,” and wood wall paneling. The building has had some alterations, including the removal of the glulam extensions and light fixtures on the east elevation at the monitor, and alterations to the north elevation windows and entry. However, the building still retains the vast majority of the character-defining features that were present at its construction in 1962 and its high level of integrity conveys the Postal Employees Credit Union’s significance as an excellent example of a modern bank.
HISTORY
(Chronological, descriptive history of the property from its construction through at least the historic period - preferably to the present)
The Postal Employees Credit Union is being nominated at the local level under Criterion C, for its architecture. It is an excellent example of a banking building designed in the International Style with significant interior features that are characteristic of Northwest Regionalism—a local variant of the Modernism movement. The building’s 1962 date of construction is also the period of significance. Following World War II, bank architecture underwent a considerable design shift in response to multiple factors including new bank legislation and a booming postwar economy. Financial institutions embraced the language of Modernism more readily than other building types as a way of casting off long-held public perception that banks were traditional and stuffy. Modernism was a form of passive advertising for banks, demonstrating a new business model that emphasized openness and friendly convenience to a growing middleclass customer base. Architects John W. Reese and Frank E. Blachly designed the credit union in “high style” Modernism, including many of Modernism’s key features such as a flat roof, smooth wall planes, ribbon windows, open interior volumes, technologically modern materials, plan type that allows for maximum light penetration, indoor-outdoor connection, and the use of pilotis to support the structure. The architects’ interior application of Northwest Regionalism is evident in the use of unpainted wood for features that include the wave-shaped ceiling of the main banking room with curved glulam beams, gumwood office doors with transom panels, and accent wall paneling. With its progressive design, auto-accessible convenience, and welcoming, light-filled interior, the Postal Employees Credit Union embodied the features of a quintessential modern bank building from the mid-century period.
RESEARCH INFORMATION
Title Records Census Records Property Tax Records Local Histories
Sanborn Maps Biographical Sources SHPO Files Interviews
Obituaries Newspapers State Archives Historic Photographs
City Directories Building Permits State Library
Local Library: University Library:University of Oregon
Historical Society: Other Respository:
Bibliography:
Baldinger, Wallace S. Twenty Northwest Architects. Eugene, OR: University of Oregon Museum of Art, 1962. Banking: Journal of the American Bankers Association, “Tomorrow’s Bank Building,” May 1945: 84-86 Belfoure, Charles. Monuments to Money: The Architecture of American Banks. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co Publishers, 2005. Bosker, Gideon and Lena Lencek. Frozen Music: A History of Portland Architecture. Portland: Western Imprints, 1985. Clasen, Meredith L. Pietro Belluschi: Modern American Architect. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999. Dyson, Carol J. and Anothony Rubano. “Banking on the Future: Modernism and the Local Bank” in Preserving the Recent Past 2. Washington DC: Historic Preservation Education Foundation, 2000: 43-56. Gelernter, Mark. History of American Architecture: Buildings in their Cultural and Technological Context. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1999. Harris, Diann. Governing by Design: Architecture, Economy, and Politics in the Twentieth Century. Pittsburg: University of Pittsburg Press, 2012. Hitchcock, Henry Russell and Philip C. Johnson. The International Style. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1966. Jung, Hyan-Tae. “Reorganizing Urban Space in the Postwar American City: The McMath, George. “The Wood Tradition Expands,” in Space, Style and Structure. Portland: Oregon Historical Society, 1974. Monahan, Allison. Architectural Education in America. Berkeley: University of California, Berkeley, 2000. The News Review. “Mr. and Mrs. J. W. Reese.” July 25, 1962: 12. Ochsner, Jeffrey Karl. Shaping Seattle Architecture: A Historical Guide to the Architects. Seattle: University of Washington Press in association with AIA Seattle, 1994. Oregonian. “Credit Union Bids Opened.” December 5, 1961: 15. Oregonian. “Credit Union Starts Work.” December 10, 1961: 111. Oregonian. “Oregon Architects Pass Out Plums for Design and Leadership.” March 12, 1961: 38. Oregonian. “Oregon Humane Society to Dedicate New Pet Memorial Garden Near Agency’s Shelter.” Septemeber 30, 1964: 7. Oregonian. “Mayor to Serve at Ground Breaking for Christian Community Mission. August 13, 1955: 29. Oregonian. “New Bank Opens for Business.” May 29, 1950: 28. Oregonian. “Weekend Open House Set for New Portland Postal Employes Credit Union Building. October 12, 1962: 18. Parnassus Foundation and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston. Money Matters: A Critical Look at Bank Architecture. New York: McGraw-Hill Publishing Company, 1990. Post Independent. “John William Reese Obituary.” November 28, 2006: 28. Reese, John. “Understanding Working Drawings as a Basis for Communication.” AORN Journal, Sugust 1968: 45-54. Schulze, Franz. Mies Van Der Rohe: A Critical Biography. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012. Schwartz, Todd. “The Arc of the Architect.” The Magazine of the University of Oregon, Spring 2010: 28-34. Smith, Perry Coke. “The Bank of the Future.” Banking: Journal of the American Bankers Association. March 1945: 33-35, 84. Weston, Richard. Modernism. London: Phaidon, 1996. Whiffin, Marcus. American Architecture Since 1780: A Style Guide. Boston: MIT Press, 1969. Zaik, Saul. Interview with the nomination preparer. December 14, 2018.