Who was Roscoe?
You might expect that Roscoe’s—the popular pub and restaurant at the corner of SE 81st Avenue and SE Stark Street—would be named for one of its owners. But no. Neither Jeremy Lewis nor Quyen Ly is a Roscoe.
According to current lore, Roscoe’s is named for the ghost of a man who died nearby and now haunts the premises.
History offers a different answer. Before Lewis and Ly opened Roscoe’s, there had been a previous restaurant and bar also named Roscoe’s in the same building. The first Roscoe’s opened in 1997. It was owned by John Hurst and Mike Winczeiwski. They chose a name common in the Hurst family tree. Hurst’s father and grandfather were both named Roscoe Patterson Hurst. His brother William used Rosco as a middle name.
The first Roscoe’s was smaller than today’s Roscoe’s. It occupied only what is now the middle area of the current Roscoe’s. That sounds strange until we realize that the 1910 building was originally divided into three separate commercial spaces.
The 1910 building was designed by the architectural firm of Roberts and Roberts for the Ukase Investment Company. They divided the building into three separate spaces, which could be used by three different businesses, each with its own Stark Street address. Partition walls could be removed to create a larger space if needed.
When the Ukase building went up in 1910, there was a lot of new construction taking place on Stark Street. Builders were replacing commercial structures destroyed in the July 4th, 1910, fire between 80th and 79th Avenues. To avoid future fire damage, builders used brick or concrete. You can still see the original brick construction in Roscoe’s back hallway.
Over the years, the Ukase building was occupied by a wide array of businesses. The interior looked quite different when the Montavilla Savings Bank—one of the earliest tenants—opened in May 1913. The Oregon Journal of May 11th, 1913, described it as “elegantly fitted up with fixtures of mahogany, marble, and bronze.”
At noon on September 3rd, 1919, what happened in the bank must have looked like something out of a silent movie. Two robbers armed with pistols walked into the bank and demanded cash. Teller William Burg refused their request, and bookkeeper George Pickering fired three shots with his revolver to attract attention. The frightened robbers scurried to their getaway car and sped down Stark Street.
In 1924, the Montavilla Bank vacated the Ukase building and moved into its new brick building at the northeast corner of 80th and Stark. (Today, the same—but remodeled—building is occupied by the Ya Hala Lebanese restaurant.)
After the bank moved out, Ray Wilson opened his bakery in 1924 and eventually added a grocery store. In 1936, he moved to a larger building across the street at Stark and 80th, where Fred Mayer would later be, and where Lewis Rents is now.
Over the ensuing years, the individual stores of the Ukase building were home to a variety of small businesses. At different times, between the 1940s and the 1980s, you could find another grocery store, an insurance agency, a shoe store, a real estate office, a women’s apparel store, a mom-and-pop café, and a card shop, to name just a few.
In 1997, the first Roscoe’s opened. It offered food, drink, and Wednesday-night comedy.
In 2004, the first Roscoe’s changed hands and reopened as Clifford’s. Clifford’s closed in 2006 just as Stark Street was revitalizing with new businesses, such as the Bipartisan Café (opened in 2005) and the remodeled Academy theater (re-opened in 2006). (Flying Pie Pizza, incidentally, had been in business since 1984).
In 2006, longtime friends Jeremy Lewis and Quyen Ly created a restaurant and bar in the Ukase building. They revived the Roscoe’s name for the pub portion of the operation. (Ly’s adjoining restaurant is Miyamoto Sushi.)
With businesses in the 1910-Ukase building spanning more than 100 years, it’s not surprising that the current owners had to spend hours removing layers of carpet and tile flooring. A ghost may not have haunted Roscoe’s, but we might say it contains the ghosts of many businesses past.
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This is part of Montavilla History Questions Answered, a series of history related articles. If you have questions about Montavilla’s past that you’d like answered, local historian Patricia Sanders will investigate your question. Please email your questions to history@montavilla.net and we may feature it alongside Patricia Sanders’ research in a future.
Roscoe’s – 8105 SE Stark Street, open daily 11 a.m. to 2 a.m.
By
This is part of Montavilla History Questions Answered, a series of history related articles. If you have questions about Montavilla’s past that you’d like answered, local historian Patricia Sanders will investigate your question. Please email your questions to history@montavilla.net and we may feature it alongside Patricia Sanders’ research in a future.