HASSO HERING

A perspective from Oregon’s mid-Willamette Valley

Queen Avenue: In search of name’s origin

Written January 23rd, 2023 by Hasso Hering

The road sign at Queen Avenue and Pacific Boulevard, photogaphed on Jan. 15, 2023.

In idle moments over the years, I’ve wondered how Queen Avenue in Albany got its name. Turns out I’m not the only one.

“Where did Queen St./Ave. get its name?” said an email that came last week.  It was signed “Bill in Corvallis.”

Nobody I ever asked that question had a definitive answer. But now that the City of Albany has called for bids to resurface Queen from the Calapooia River to Ferry Street, I’ve tried again to find out.

I spent a little time looking at digitized Albany city directories, available on the city’s website, and old newspapers available on newspapers.com.

I still don’t know exactly why the street is named what it is, but I know a little more than I did before. Here’s what I learned.

The first mention I could find was from 1909, when the plat for the Hazelwood Addition was filed. The story in the “Albany Democrat” mentioned several street names that still exist such as Lincoln, Broadway and Hop, “with Queen at the corner leading towards the Calapooia bridge.”

A street map from 1936 shows Queen Street, from the corner of Broadway toward the river. At Broadway, Queen connects with an east-west route then named 15th Street. From Marion Street east, 15th Street becomes A Street on the map.

Street naming became an issue in October 1946, when city officials were reported to be discussing it with the Albany Jaycees. (Why the Jaycees, the story didn’t say.)

In February 1948, the Democrat-Herald reported that a plan for street signs and street names, worked out by a committee the year before, had been approved by the city engineer and the council.

“Included among the changes is the renaming of 15th Street Queen Avenue for its entire length, from the Calapooia River to Geary Street,” the paper said.

(It also said the name of Takena would become Cottage Street along its entire length from Queen to Ninth. Eventually, the opposite happened, so now it’s Takena on the whole street and Cottage is gone.)

There may be some confusion in the printed record about the timing and details. In connection with a related story here in 2019, Gordon Steffensmeier of the city engineering staff told me the ordinance making name changes didn’t pass until March 23, 1949.

To sum up, Queen Street existed in 1909, on the short track outside the west side of Albany. About 40 years later the name was extended east to Geary Street.

Later still, it was extended again once the street was built eastward, ending at Waverly.

In 1969, though, Queen was still in two pieces, with an undeveloped gap of two blocks west of Geary. Gus August of the Democrat-Herald reported this on July 24 that year after he took a ride in a Cessna 175 piloted by a city council member and took a photo from the air.

Which still leaves the source of the original name hidden in the mist of time. Let’s hazard a guess.

In the last part of the 19th century, Albany papers such as the Democrat and especially the weekly “Herald-Disseminator” were full of stories about the British royal house.

In May 1895, the “Albany Weekly Herald” observed Queen Victoria’s 76th birthday and noted that she had reigned for 58 years, “one of the greatest periods in the world’s history.”

“A Good Queen and Noble Woman,” the headline called her.

Victoria died in January 1901. Is it unreasonable to think that her devoted fans in Albany named a little road out of town for the departed queen? (hh)





7 responses to “Queen Avenue: In search of name’s origin”

  1. Tom sauter says:

    Apparently you Hasso did the wrong research…like much of your opinion as a editor throughout you career..try looming at the Donation land claim act of 1850…there you will find all the streets named after the claimants…

  2. Lou T says:

    We (including Bill from Corvallis) were discussing this at coffee last Friday. The other Bill (from Albany) in our group posed the question but none of us could answer it. Thanks for the information and I’m sure we’ll be talking about it at coffee this Friday.

  3. Cap B. says:

    You were wondering why the powers that be in the 1940s in Albany were discussing street names with the JayCees. The Albany “Junior Chamber of Commerce” men (it was all men then), aged probably 25 to 50…a rough guess on my part…ran the Timber Carnival and also had their fingers in the running of Albany for many years.

 

 
HH Today: A perspective from Oregon’s mid-Willamette Valley
Albany Albany City Council Albany council Albany downtown Albany Fire Department Albany housing Albany parks Albany Planning Commission Albany police Albany Post Office Albany Public Works Albany riverfront Albany schools Albany Station Albany streets Albany traffic Albany urban renewal apartments ARA Benton County bicycling bike lanes Bowman Park Bryant Park Calapooia River CARA climate change COVID-19 Cox Creek Cox Creek path Crocker Lane cumberland church cycling Dave Clark Path DEQ downtown Albany Edgewater Village Highway 20 homeless housing Interstate 5 land use Linn County Millersburg Monteith Riverpark North Albany ODOT Oregon coast Oregon legislature Pacific Power Portland & Western Queen Avenue Republic Services Riverside Drive Santiam Canal Scott Lepman Talking Water Gardens The Banks Tom Cordier Union Pacific urban renewal Water Avenue Waterfront Project Waverly Lake Willamette River


Copyright 2022. All Rights Reserved. Hasso Hering.
Website Serviced by Santiam Communications
Hasso Hering