Luaus Room Portland Oregon, Portland, OR (restaurant)

Name:Luaus Room Portland Oregon
Type:restaurant
Street:6310 SE Foster Rd
City:Portland
State:OR
Zip:
country:USA
Phone:
Status:defunct

Description:
Found a menu from this place that looks like it's from the 1950's or maybe earlier. Have not found it in any of the books. Asked a few people and they have not seen anything from it. Have you?

[ Edited by: hecktow 2008-04-24 09:13 ]

[ Edited by: hecktow 2008-04-24 09:27 ]

[ Edited by: hecktow 2008-04-25 23:11 ]

well it took about 2 1/2 years but I can now bump this post with a new found item. Artist was "Harvey" out of Sturgis Mich. Again the luaus Room was in Portland, OR. Anyone find other items from this place? Anyone?

I found a vintage dealer a few years ago who had a stack of 35 unused placemats. PM me if anyone is after one. I know it's an obscure one. I've lived around the corner from this place most of my life and never would have imagined a tiki bar there.

Here's a Trader Vic's pic from a 1963 Life cookbook.
First published in 1958. All photos in the book appeared in Life Magazine from 1951 to 1957.

[ Edited by: Adam Aku Aku 2016-02-19 20:49 ]

[ Edited by: Adam aku aku 2016-02-20 14:38 ]

Thanks for the posts, Adam. That's a cool placemat.

Your hypothesis that the photograph was used as a model for the drawing in the placemat is almost assuredly correct. Every item in the drawing appears in the photograph with the exception of the pineapple.

There is not much about the Luaus Room on the internet.

A text-only advertisement appears in the back of the Class of 1957 yearbook for Franklin High School (Portland OR) reading;
LUAUS ROOM
Banquet Facilities up to
150 people
Parking Lot 63rd and Foster

I also found the following in a copyright book;
Luaus Room, Portland, Ore.; placemat. © Kalamazoo Vegetable Parchment Co., Harvey Paper Division t.a. Harvey; i|Jan57; Ki4.7672.

This dates the placemat (or at least a placemat) to 1957 and also establishes that "Harvey" is not the artist, but rather that the Harvey Paper Division of the Kalamazoo Vegetable Parchment Company produced the placemat. Prior to merging with the Kalamazoo Vegetable Parchment Company in 1943, the Harvey Paper Division was known as the Harvey Paper Products Company and, indeed, was located in Sturgis, Michigan.

If your placemat is the placemat in the copyright book, then the photograph in the 1963 cookbook must be from before 1963.

Does the cookbook say the photograph is a Trader Vic's location?

[ Edited by: kenbo-jitsu 2016-02-19 16:37 ]

From Google Maps, here is what it looks like today. The building was built in 1926 so this is the building the Luaus Room was in. The building extends off to the right of the picture and contains several addresses. The 6310 address (at least today) is the end space on the left. It has been vacant since at least 2007.

I've never seen that half of the building used for anything my entire life. The right side was a fortune cookie factory through the 90's. And at one point was a bank. Said to be where the last "old west" style bank robbery took place with a getaway on horseback.
Just remembered a time when I fell asleep in the alley there with a two liter pop bottle of tequila in hand. Those were the days!

[ Edited by: Adam Aku Aku 2016-02-19 20:54 ]

On 2016-02-19 12:07, kenbo-jitsu wrote:

Does the cookbook say the photograph is a Trader Vic's location

SF

On 2016-02-19 20:59, Adam Aku Aku wrote:

On 2016-02-19 12:07, kenbo-jitsu wrote:

Does the cookbook say the photograph is a Trader Vic's location

SF

The menu, coffee grog and fog cutter mugs and Morgantown glass and large bowl are all Vic's in the photo I believe.

Of course. all the little places copied from the big three. I wonder WHICH Trader Vic's, it is unusual to see two Cannibal Carvings in there, which I have not seen in any other Trader Vic photos. Here is one in an illustration for a 40s Trader Vic brochure, in the store in Oakland:

Hard to see, but in the forefront of the Vic's photo above there's a shrunken head sitting on the table.

That Trader Vic's photo is from the August 20, 1956 Life Magazine. here is a little better image of the photo. Wonder where the third cannibal is hiding?

DC

Ah!! Excellent, DC! And this fits right into the time-line. Whoever designed the place-mat for the Luaus Room must have done so between August 1956 and January 1957 -- using that issue of Life.

I wonder how long the Luaus Room lasted? It was in business in 1957. That's really all we know.