Portland Confidential: Sex, Crime, and Corruption in the Rose City

(Paperback)

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Description

It may come as a shock, especially to anyone who has come to regard Portland as a haven for enlightened progressive thought, light rail, and lattes for all, not that long ago - in fact as recently as the 1950s - Portland was known throughout the country as a Mecca of vice and sin. Portland Confidential rips the covers from Portland's biggest dirty little secret. It was a side-open town, with purveyors of all the traditional vices operating openly under the noses of the local police. All they had to do was pay off the cops and, of course, their bosses in City Hall. One day in the spring of 1956, it all blew up in everyone's faces with newspaper exposes, indictments of public officials - including the chief of police, the district attorney, and the Mayor - and shameful national headlines.

Reviews

Portland Confidential lays it out in all its gritty glory, rattling skeletons in the city's many musty closets. -- Seattle Times
A film noir incarnation of the Rose City... The city writes about is a lost world -- nastier, denser, wilder and more elegant than today.-- Willamette Week

Author Bio

Author Phil Stanford has worked as a columnist for both the Oregonian and the Portland Tribune and has written for a number of national publications including the New York Times Magazine, Rolling Stone, and the Columbia Journalism Review on defense and intelligence matters. Along the way, he has also worked as a magazine editor and as as a licensed private investigator in Portland and Miami. His other titles include: The Peyton-Allan Files and from Feral House White House Call Girl, and Rose City Vice.