“Ask anyone in mid-Multnomah County where The Barn is located, and they’ll tell you on Northeast 148th Avenue between Airport Way and Marine Drive. It’s where folks from all around come to buy produce during the Northwest’s bountiful harvest season.” —From a story in the June 2009 Memo about The Barn’s owners, Tom and Sheila Trapold.
East Portland’s iconic business The Barn is closing after decades of producing fresh produce for families in east Portland and beyond. A new 20-barrel taproom is set to replace it in the spring. In 2009, Sheila Trapold (barely) holds a huge cabbage grown at Trapold Farms’ Sauvie Island operation. A Mid-county mainstay for decades, people came from miles around to buy their produce at The Barn. COURTESY TRAPOLD FARMS
This year, when The Barn closes for the season on the day before Thanksgiving, it’ll be closing forever.
After decades of not only farming but also retailing produce in east Portland, Tom and Sheila Trapold are closing their iconic outlet and selling the land it’s on. “It’s so bittersweet. I’ve been here 40 years, and I feel bad for all my customers,” Sheila Trapold said in a phone interview. “I feel really horrible and really guilty, but I don’t know what else to do. We tried to sell it to somebody to keep it going: the brokerage houses, other farmers, but nobody wants to work that hard.”
The 2.5-acre property on Northeast 148th Avenue near Marine Drive was listed for $500,000. Geoff Phillips, who owns Bailey’s Taproom and The Upper Lip, two downtown brewpubs, bought the property after some negotiations. Phillips, a California transplant who moved to Portland about 10 years ago, lives in Laurelhurst with his wife, who is expecting, and their three-year-old daughter. He plans to open Level Beer, a family-friendly, 20-barrel brewery and taproom on the property that’s set to begin operating next spring. “I want someplace I’d be comfortable taking my family to,” Phillips said in a phone interview. “Right now, there’s no place like that [that serves alcohol].” He won’t be serving food, but he will have a variety of food trucks that will pepper the property for hungry patrons. Phillips said his goal is to create a bucolic environment. He’ll create a children’s play area, have picnic tables and retain The Barn’s greenhouse. In addition, he’ll grow hops on the property.
Reaction to news of The Barn’s closure was swift, and comments were universally sad. Here’s a sample:
Audrey Schmidt Cook: “Ugh, first the farmers market, then Rossi farm, and now the Barn.”
Julie Sanchez-Parks: “Sad to see the Barn go, but eager to check out the brewery!”
Christine Moore: “And can’t wait to see the increased traffic @ 148th, especially with folks leaving a bar.”
Luke Shepard: “See ya I guess. Loved getting produce there and pumpkins at the patch back in the day.”
Judy Yost: “What’s going on with the Barn? No way!!!!! Please tell me there isn’t another BOX building going in with for lease signs and be a tax write-off for someone.”
Rob Portland: “This sucks. Everything is drying up out here. :(”
Christine Moore: “That is terrible news!! The Barn is a treasure for those of us in East County to get good local affordable produce! We can get beer anywhere.”
Kathy Reese: “I am beyond sad. East county keeps losing its farms. It’s fresh, local (read that in our neighborhood, not just Portland area) produce. While I do like progressive businesses coming to our area, I hate losing our farms!”
Teresa Osburn: “JUST WHAT WE NEED … beer … no fresh vegs and fruit.”
Rebekah Gonzales Wanke: “Noooo! I love The Barn!”
“Everybody’s shocked,” said Sheila. “If my husband fell over dead in the field today, it’d end too!”
The closure in November will give them time to get moved into their new house they built on Sauvie Island, where they moved the farming operation to in 2004. Trapold Farms has also been downsizing there, Sheila said. “We’re going to do more fishing and camping and traveling,” she said. “Tom’s still farming with the neighbor. He’s going to get his farmer fix and his tractor fix. He’s kind of grooming the neighbors to take over the pumpkins and his squash, ’cause that’s his baby.”
Trapold Farms—A limited history
Sheila told the Memo in 2009 that Tom’s parents, Alfon and Elly Trapold, began custom farming for landowners in the 1930s before buying land just east of the airport by the Columbia River “as [Alfon] could here and there” and starting to build up his own farm. All five Trapold children helped their parents on the farm as they were growing up. Until her death in 2004, Tom’s sister Gloria Bradford, known far and wide as “the Pumpkin Lady,” operated a retail pumpkin patch for decades. Two of Tom’s other siblings moved onto other ventures while brother Bill worked the farm with Tom until he retired in 1999. Since then, it’s been just Tom and Sheila.
In 2004, the Trapolds completed the six-year transition of moving the farming operation from mid-Multnomah County to 400 acres on Sauvie Island, with The Barn acting as the retail side of Trapold Farms, Inc. Tom and Sheila have also purchased a house on Sauvie Island and moved there.
