Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

Longest serving instructor Allen Epp passes away

Photos and story by James Hill

Allen Epp, 83, who taught history at PCC for more than 50 years since the college began as an adult vocational program in Portland Public Schools, has passed away. A memorial service is being planned on Sylvania Campus at the end of winter term.

“Allen was beloved by his students and colleagues for his devotion to teaching and history and his warm sense of humor,” said Linda Gerber, Sylvania Campus President. “He cared deeply about his adopted state and was creative and energetic in sharing that enthusiasm with his students.”

The annual Sylvania Campus Allen Epp Service Awards in the spring is named after him in recognition of his outstanding contributions, a model of service, to PCC and our community, Gerber said.

Allen Epp had been an instructor for 57 years, the last 51 with PCC until his retirement from the college in 2006. The mark that he left on the college remained.

“He made an impact on my life,” said Kathy Alzner, history instructor at PCC and a former student in Epp’s U.S. History class, at his retirement. “His classroom was a joy. The jokes he told were interesting. Students would be writing what he said down, including the joke. He would let them write and write until they realized it was a joke.”

Epp’s teachings have spanned generations. One colleague remarked that he had a student who took his course because his mom had been a student of Epp’s as well as his grand mother.

He taught history part-time at each of the comprehensive campuses of the college and finished as a history instructor at the Sylvania Campus. Allen was the longest-serving staff member at PCC. He was born and raised in a small Nebraska town during the Great Depression. Epp was full of stories about just about everything. Ever wondered about the Dust Bowl? With a smile, he related stories like the one when his family had to light a lantern at 3 p.m. in the afternoon due to the dust cloud’s blanketing darkness.

Epp began his teaching career in Iowa before moving to Portland. Some of his jobs included teaching English and social studies at Roosevelt High School and a three-year stint at Kennedy Grade School, now a McMenamin’s pub. Since 1966 he had taught nothing but American history at PCC.

“I enjoy the Colonial days of American history,” Epp said in 2006. “I love teaching about religion in the United States because there was a lot of religion involved in those early days.”

Epp followed most portions of the Oregon Trail, studying significant spots and walking the same rutted paths that settlers used during the migration West. His favorite part was the South Pass in the Rocky Mountains because “you can visualize there the people moving through, on to Oregon, California, and the Mormons to Utah. It’s a thrilling place.”

During the summer, he would go on excursions to the Santa Fe Trail, to Canada and to Alaska to analyze the old churches and brothels, which were signatures of the Old West.

“I enjoy looking up historical places,” Epp said. “I have been to every state except Mississippi.”

Epp was a valuable resource for those needing research during his tenure at the college. His most satisfying moment came during the bicentennial in 1977 when he produced 20 historical programs for OPB. He used most of them to help illustrate topics in his classes.

Epp became interested in history through his grandmother, who told him stories of the good old days in Germany, Holland and Russia and his family’s immigration to the U.S. This helped stimulate his desire to learn about history. In all, Allen Epp knew his history and had seen quite a bit of it, and appreciated how things have changed.

“What is most enjoyable is teaching students who are more intrigued and better-behaved than those in high school,” he chuckled. “I came from a one-room country school in Nebraska that consisted of a total of 28 students. That’s smaller in size than the classes I taught here.”

From his insights into the Japanese war balloons that floated over the Oregon Coast during World War II to recounting the history of a person’s home town, he’ll be missed.

“What struck me about Allen was when he first came to my office to chat,” said former Division Dean of Social Sciences at Sylvania Brooke Gondara before Epp’s retirement. “I came here from the extreme and remote corner of Montana, but he knew everything about it. It struck me that he literally traveled and knew about every place. He has been a great teacher and will leave a wonderful legacy.”