Patrick Building

In 1968 the company purchased the three-story Harker Building, an historically significant structure with a cast iron front that was built in 1868. While the company records refer to “the building”, in reality Patrick Lumber Co. purchased two buildings that were adjacent to one another and shared a common wall: The Harker Building and the Poppleton Building, immediately to the north.

Patrick Co. refurbished the Harker Builing façade and remodeled the first floor in 1970, receiving recognition for the preservation work a top award winner in the Fourth Annual Esco Remodeling Contest, a recognition program established to encourage private renewal efforts that make the Portland metropolitan area more attractive.

“At the time, that part of town—1st and 2nd Avenues near Yamhill—was pretty skuzzy. Jack Patrick bought the building and fixed it up. I remember he was pretty proud of the fact he was able to make a contribution to historic preservation,” said Bill Buck, whose father, Peter, was one of Jack Patrick’s life long buddies.

At first these buildings were simply part of the Company’s real estate portfolio, generating lease income from a variety of tenants. At various times the ground floor spaces were occupied by restaurants (Naughty Janes, Fernando’s, and Aldo’s in the ground floor of the Harker building) and retail shops (Kahl’s Interiors, Partners in Time, a bookstore whose name escapes, and Hair M men’s grooming salon, in the ground floor of the Poppleton building).

The Harker Building was renamed the Patrick Building and in n 1976, the Company remodeled the second and third floors of the Patrick building for office space. The following year, after 44 years in the Terminal Sales Building – known as “Lumber Central” in Portland—the Company moved into the third floor of the Patrick Building.

In later years, as the Company grew and it became evident that more space was needed, another remodel removed a portion of the shared wall between the two buildings and created a larger space across both buildings’ third floors. The floors were not at the same level as one another, so in order to provide access between six to ten steps were built, allowing foot traffic to flow from one part of the office to the other.

When the Patrick Land Company was formed in 1974, this new entity became the holding company for Patrick’s real estate portfolio, including the buildings. Over time, the Patrick Land Co. began divesting assets and in 1983 the Land Co. sold the buildings to RRT Properties, a partnership owned by Tom Carstensen, Bob McCracken and Ron Yeager, the primary principals in Patrick Lumber Company at the time. RRT continued to lease space in the buildings to Patrick Lumber Co. and other tenants until 2007 (check the date) when the partnership sold the building to Beardsley Properties. Coincidentally, in 2008, the Company moved to its current location on SW 10th Avenue across from the Multnomah County Library main branch.