The Portland Rose, Dining Car 1950s
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Portland earns its nickname, the ‘City of Roses,’ thanks to its ideal climate. The Willamette Valley's warm, dry summers and mild, wet winters create the perfect environment for one of the most loved flowers in the world.
The passenger train called the Portland Rose was given its name in 1930 and featured through service to Portland, Tacoma and Seattle. It was operated jointly by the Union Pacific Railroad and Chicago and Northwestern Railway.
The train featured a ladies’ lounge, men’s club, library, barbershop, library, soda fountain, restaurant and a glass enclosed sightseeing parlor.
Portland became synonymous with roses after the 1905 Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition when tens of thousands of roses – specifically the Madame Caroline Testout variety – were planted to beautify the city.
The spectacle brought 1.5 million visitors to the area and was described as:’ miles of roses, roses banked in bowers of ineffable beauty, roses in hedges, roses in streets, roses on quaint trellises, roses climbing rockbound walls to defuse their fragrance, roses everywhere to exemplify the hospitable invitation ‘ For you, a rose in Portland grows.’
To capitalize on this success, the Portland Rose Festival was launched in 1907 and remains a popular and beloved cultural celebration, held every June.
During WWII, an International Rose Test Garden established in Washington Park served as a safe haven to protect hybrid roses from international bombings. The park- admission is free - now boasts more than 10,000 rose bushes that bloom from May to October.
Today, Portland’s deep-rooted floral legacy thrives with the flower featured on everything from the city's police cars to local manhole covers, and the city has a rich century-old history of immigrant floral farmers and independent florists.
The Portland Rose train lasted until 1971, when Amtrak relieved private companies of their obligation to run passenger services.
Each order includes a print of the interior menu.
All printed in USA.
