Forest City used to be one of Portland's old nicknames. You still catch pieces of it here and there. Forest Avenue. Forest City Trail. Old postcards. Old signs. Old businesses that used the name because people probably knew what it meant. Now it mostly hides in plain sight.
Which makes it feel even stranger. I mean, yes, Portland has trees. Great ones. Deering Oaks, Baxter Woods, Evergreen Cemetery, the Western Prom, the old white pines leaning over the West End. But the Portland most of us move through every day feels more like brick, salt air, narrow streets, parking debates, and seagulls ripping open purple trash bags. If you were naming it now, you would probably end up with something more obvious. Port City. Lobster City. Brick City. So why Forest City?
The oldest hard clue I can find is not a park or some grand row of old trees. It is a cemetery. Forest City Cemetery was named in 1858, and it is not even in Portland. It is in South Portland, though Portland still owns it. The cemetery sits on nearly 100 acres and holds around 30,000 burials.
That feels very Portland to me. A little confusing geographically, but beautiful once you understand it. And a lot more interesting than just saying, "well, we have a lot of trees."
The name seems to come from the mid-1800s, when cemeteries were not just places people were buried. They were also places people visited. Before every city had big public parks, families went to cemeteries to walk, sit, think, and be somewhere quiet and green. It sounds strange now, but at the time, a cemetery could be one of the prettiest public places in a city.
So maybe Forest City was never just about trees. Maybe it was about what Portland wanted to feel like. A city by the water, yes, but also a place with parks, cemeteries, elms, oaks, and enough shade to make a hard little port town feel softer around the edges.
Then, in 1879, Deering Oaks became part of the city. Fifty acres were deeded to Portland, and suddenly Forest City had a place you could actually point to. Ponds, paths, old trees, and a piece of open land big enough to make Portland feel like it could breathe.
There are days when Forest City feels almost funny, like an old nickname Portland has outgrown. But then you catch the city at the right angle.
Deering Oaks early in the morning. The Western Prom at golden hour. The canopy on Baxter Boulevard. An old cemetery where some of the best trees in Portland are standing watch over people who lived here before your street had traffic.
Then the name starts to make sense again. Not because Portland is a forest, but because it keeps trying to feel a little more like one.
Forest City is not really a description. It is more like a reminder. A city does not stay green by accident. Trees come down. Lots get paved. Shade disappears one storm, one project, one "necessary improvement" at a time. A street can lose a tree in one afternoon and not feel the same again for fifty years.
That is the thing about Forest City. It is quiet. It is not trying to sell you anything. It does not feel like a slogan. It feels older than that. Like Portland trying to remember that a city is better with shade.
And maybe it is not totally gone. Hearts of Pine has been bringing Forest City back too, which feels right. Some old names only work if people start using them again.
