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Sunday, March 19, 2006

By Su-Jin Yim

You could argue it's only a sign. A 46-foot-tall, Oregon-shaped sign with flashing bulbs and an airborne deer, but an advertisement nonetheless.

But then you'd miss the point of living in Portland: The Made in Oregon sign that punctuates downtown's skyline is a quirky landmark in a city-town that crowns a Rose Festival Queen, quenches pedestrians' thirst with its Benson Bubblers and preserves street side hitching rings for horses.

The White Stag sign, built to sell sugar in 1927 and the only good thing about a 2005 movie starring Ice Cube, has become in its 79 years a symbol of puff-your-chest-out civic pride.

Now, the University of Oregon wants to move into the building below the sign and use it to advertise the Ducks programs.

First, though, the university must overcome our special devotion to the sign. And developer Art DeMuro will have to step carefully through the bitter dregs of a dispute involving one of the city's most prominent business families.

The sign today is complex, says Portland Oregon Visitors Association spokeswoman Deborah Wakefield. It advertises the made in Oregon business but also stands for all of Oregon.

"If it says U of O, it's obviously a sign advertising the fact that the university is there," she says. "It loses some of the layers."

The sign started out life with a simple state outline and the words "White Satin Sugar."

In 1957, the White Stag company added its name and the deer to advertise outerwear until that company moved to, gasp, California. By the mid-1990s, the sign fell into such disrepair, it sparked a feud. The city stepped in. After mediating between the building owner and the sign owner, the sign--and Rudolph--was saved.

Enter another layer.

Old Town is on the cusp of its latest reincarnation with condos and new small businesses. People are optimistic.

The neighborhood association loves that UO will bring 500 students and faculty, even if the school newspaper says Old Town is too dingy.

But remove "Old Town" from the sign or the building's water tower?

The idea peeved some neighborhood activists at a recent meeting of the Old Town Chinatown Neighborhood Association.

"Old Town, frankly, needs as much identification as UO," said Pat Rumer, who sits on the neighborhood's arts, culture and history committee.

Whether the sign can be changed at all remains a question.

It became a city landmark in 1978. That means the historic landmarks commission must approve changes in its "style, animation and color," but not its words, says Jeff Joslin, the city's land-use supervisor.

And now, the final layer. It's a sticky one.

Sam Naito, who leases the sign from Ramsay Signs of Portland, isn't all that excited to give it up.

"If we have to, we can move the sign to another building. It costs money, but we would be able to do that," Naito says. "Several buildings wanted us to come put the sign on their building."

Of course, he doesn't own the sign. His lease expires in 22 months, sign owner Darryl Paulsen points out. And the city code bans new rooftop signs.

You could surmise that Naito's reluctance might stem from something else. His late brother's family, with whom he fought in court for years, owns the building below.

Anne Naito-Campbell of the Bill Naito Company, didn't want to entertain the thought.

"I can see where you're going with this," Naito-Campbell said. "We're selling the building. The sign is on the building. It's really going to be negotiated between the people who own the sign and the people who own the building."

DeMuro hasn't closed the deal to buy the building, which is part of a larger deal, but it looks good, he says. A long-term lease with UO is integral. If school officials sign up, he says, "they want the whole city to know that University of Oregon has a large presence."

He agreed to take the neighborhood's concerns to UO, which isn't commenting on the issue.

"This was not an easy sell in the beginning," DeMuro said, citing the problems that remain in the neighborhood. "To go back to them and say you can't have those anymore, it's really retracting this benefit."

Besides, though the sign is loved, it's not really an icon, Wakefield says gently.

"It's just not well known enough beyond Portland. When you think about Seattle, you get an instant image of the Space Needle. When you think of San Francisco, it's fog and the Golden Gate Bridge," she says.

Ouch. But wait, she went to school in Seattle.

Clearly, she's not from around here.

Su-Jin Yim: 503-294-7611; suyim@news.oregonian.com

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