Kenton at a glance
The county, ZIP codes, housing eras and burning rules that shape chimney work in Kenton.
- County
- Multnomah County, OR
- ZIP codes
- 97217, 97203
- Part of town
- North Portland
- Typical homes
- Houses from the Swift company-town years after 1911
- Brick commercial buildings from around 1910 in the Kenton Commercial Historic District
- Mid-century and postwar houses on the outlying blocks
- Watch for
- unlined pre-1940 brick chimneys
- unreinforced masonry and earthquake bracing
- orphaned furnace flues after gas conversions
- historic district rules
- Wood burning rules
- Kenton burns under the Multnomah County wood smoke rule, which applies in any month the air forecast is poor: a yellow day invites households to consider limiting burning, and a red day bars fireplaces, wood and pellet stoves and outdoor wood fires from noon until noon the next day, with exemptions for cases such as households whose only heat is wood or whose income qualifies, renewed every year by the end of September. Oregon's home-sale law also requires an uncertified stove or insert to be removed and destroyed at sale.
Homes and chimneys in Kenton
Kenton's core is 1910s workers' houses on the blocks off N Denver and N Interstate, built when Kenton began in 1911 as a company town for the Swift Meat Packing Company beside Portland's main stockyards, and they still carry their original brick chimneys.
A Kenton company-town chimney is one slim stack doing two jobs: a flue for the fireplace and a second flue for the coal or oil furnace in the basement. Neither was reliably lined, and after more than a century the joints inside have taken the acids of every fire and the rain of every winter.
Farther out, the mid-century and postwar houses came with a single masonry fireplace, usually tile lined, and the brick commercial buildings along N Denver in the Kenton Commercial Historic District carry chimneys and parapets of their own. North of the houses the ground drops to Delta Park, the Expo Center and the raceway on the old Vanport site, so residential calls come from the blocks south of Columbia.
Chimneys and fireplaces in Kenton
The Kenton chimney stock is company-town brick: a slim stack with a fireplace flue and a furnace flue side by side, often with no clay tile in either, plus a tile-lined single fireplace in the mid-century houses on the outlying blocks.
The furnace flue is the one that fails quietly. Once the coal or oil furnace gave way to gas, and later to a high-efficiency unit vented through the side wall, that flue was left to a water heater or to nothing, and a flue too large and too cold for its load runs wet, so the acidic condensate softens the joints from inside.
What we get called for in Kenton
Kenton's calls follow its two housing eras, the company-town brick and the postwar tile-lined fireplace, and these are the five jobs that housing produces.
A 1910s Kenton house that is changing hands, or lighting its fireplace for the first time since the previous owner, gets a Level 2 camera inspection before anything else, because from the hearth you cannot tell whether the flue was ever tiled or where the joints have opened. The pictures also show whether the furnace flue beside it still carries anything, and an unreinforced stack that tall above a 1911 roof is worth a plain conversation about bracing.
from $129parts and labor
Read more → Two liners come up again and again on the company-town blocks: a stainless liner for a fireplace flue that never had tile, sized to the firebox and wrapped in insulation when the clearances require it, and a smaller liner for a furnace flue that now serves only a water heater. A flue serving nothing is sealed at the top and at the thimble so it stops moving damp air through the house.
from $1999parts and labor
Read more → The part of a 1910s stack above the roof takes the worst of it: open joints on the weather side, brick faces popped off by freezing water, and a crown cracked across. We rake and repoint the joints with a mortar matched to the old brick and replace the spalled units, and on a contributing building along N Denver in the historic district we check whether the visible work needs city review before we start.
from $449parts and labor
Read more → The mid-century and postwar houses on Kenton's outlying blocks have one tile-lined fireplace that gets used through the wet months, and a yearly sweep with the Level 1 look-over is the regular call there. On the older houses we brush the fireplace flue and put a light down the neighboring furnace flue on the same visit.
from $249parts and labor
Read more → An uncapped flue on a 1911 house has been taking rain for a long time, and the first sign is usually a damp smell in the firebox after a storm or water sitting on the smoke shelf. We fit a stainless cap with a spark screen sized to the flue, or a multi-flue cap that covers both openings on a two-flue stack, so the furnace flue stops acting as a drain into the basement.
from $299parts and labor
Read more → Getting to you in Kenton
We come into Kenton from I-5 by way of N Lombard St or N Interstate Ave, or along N Columbia Blvd from the east, and the Paul Bunyan statue at N Interstate and N Denver is the easiest meeting point to give us.
From Denver the residential blocks are a turn or two away along N Argyle St and the side streets, and a parking note saves time. Tell us when you book whether the chimney is on a house or on one of the brick buildings in the historic district, because the second brings a taller ladder and a question for the city about review.
Kenton, if you are new here
Kenton was laid out in 1911 as a company town for the Swift Meat Packing Company, and Portland's main stockyards operated here.
The Paul Bunyan statue at N Interstate and N Denver joined the National Register of Historic Places on January 28, 2009, and the Kenton Commercial Historic District along N Denver was listed in 2001.
Vanport, the wartime housing project, stood inside today's Kenton boundaries until May 30, 1948, when a railroad berm holding back the Columbia gave way and the flood destroyed it.
Kenton is one of six city conservation districts drawn from the 1993 Albina Community Plan, and the Kenton Commercial Historic District is also on the city's list of designated historic districts.
Residents orient by the statue, Kenton Park, Delta Park, the Expo Center and Portland International Raceway on the low ground to the north.
Kenton chimney questions
Do you cover all of Kenton, including the 97203 side as well as 97217?
Yes, every residential block of Kenton is on our route, whichever of its two ZIP codes your address falls in. The low ground along Columbia with Delta Park, the Expo Center and the raceway is not housing, so for a Kenton house the visit is booked the same as anywhere else in North Portland, at the posted price and with no separate trip charge when we do the work.
We just bought a 1915 house in Kenton and want the fireplace checked before fall. How far out are you booking?
Book it in late summer and you will usually be on the schedule within a couple of weeks. Wait until the first cold week of October and the queue across North Portland stretches, because everyone calls at once. A 1915 Kenton house that has never had a camera down the flue should get the Level 2 before the first fire rather than a sweep alone, and that is a longer visit worth scheduling early.
What does a chimney sweep in Kenton include on a two-flue company-town stack?
On a Kenton two-flue stack, the sweep covers the firebox, smoke chamber, damper and the fireplace flue top to bottom, with a vacuum running the whole time. We put a light down the furnace flue while we are there. The before and after pictures from inside both flues are yours, with a note on anything that needs a second look, and the Level 1 look-over of the parts we can reach is part of the visit.
Our Kenton bungalow from the Swift years has a brick flue with no tile in it. Is the fireplace usable?
Not until a camera has been down it and we have seen what the joints are doing. Bare brick with open joints lets heat and flue gases reach the framing around the stack, and a 1910s joint is rarely tight after this many winters. The usual answer on these blocks is a stainless liner sized to the firebox, which turns the old brick into a sleeve around a continuous flue. Keep it cold until then.
Does a Multnomah County red day apply to a wood stove in Kenton, or only to fireplaces?
It applies to both, and to pellet stoves and backyard wood fires as well, unless your household holds a county exemption such as wood being your only heat. The restriction lasts from noon one day to noon the next, and the county can call one in any month when poor air is expected, not just in winter. Kenton adds nothing on top of the county rule; our wood burning rules guide explains the colors and the exemption form.
Our Kenton house is in the conservation district. Does repointing the chimney need city approval?
Sometimes, because visible exterior work on a contributing building in a Portland conservation or historic district can need historic resource review. Which repairs are exempt is a list we confirm with the city before we start rather than guess at. Either way, we match the mortar and brick so the repointed stack looks as it did. You hear what the city says before the work.
What should I ask before letting a chimney company onto a Kenton roof?
Start with our guide to checking out an Oregon contractor, which walks through the state's lookup and what the results mean. Then ask two things on the phone: is the price for the job published ahead of time, and do you get to see the camera footage from your own flue. On a Kenton stack from 1911 or a brick building on Denver, a company that answers both plainly is the one to book.
Near Kenton
From Kenton the same truck works the rest of the peninsula, the neighborhoods down Interstate toward the river, and Piedmont and Woodlawn to the east.
Services, symptoms, fireplace types and guides that connect to this page.