The Expo Center was built on the site of the former Portland Union Stockyards. (This area is considered part of Kenton, which, at one point, was it's own town, but is now a district of Portland.) Union Meat Company presided over a sprawling honeycomb network of corrals for livestock. The area also included rail lines, as well as an electric streetcar stop at the Red Steer Cafe, next to the Pacific International Livestock Pavilion. In 1909 Swift built a meat packing plant nearby, and employed 600 workers. Stock came from all over Oregon, and parts of Washington by train, and sometimes in cattle drives. The workers at Kenton butchered more beef than any other town in the Northwest. Once a year, the Pacific International Livestock Exposition was held here, but the meat packing plant is gone, the stockyards are gone, and grand livestock Expos appear to be a thing of the past. The Livestock Pavilion *may* survive at the Expo Center, but there are plans to destroy the oldest buildings at the site so that the Expo Center can be "revitalized." |