Résumé

Principal, Emil Schacht, Architect, Portland, OR, 1884-1915; As architect and historian Richard Ellison Ritz has noted, little is known of Schacht's career before 1890; it is possible that he worked for other Portland architects between 1884-1890. (See, Richard Ellison Ritz, Architects of Oregon, [Portland, OR: Lair Hill Publishing, 2002], p. 347-351.) Schacht had his own office in Room #15 of the 1st National Bank Building in 1885. The 1st National Bank had its headquarters on the southeast corner of 1st Avenue and Washington Street at the time. (See R.L. Polk and Company's Portland, Oregon, City Directory, 1885, p. 522.) In 1889, Schacht had his own office at 288 I Street in Portland, This 1889 directory listed 13 architects working in Portland at the time. (See R.L. Polk and Company's Portland, Oregon, City Directory, 1889, p. 914.)

The end of his career coincided with increasing discrimination against German-Americans (even though he was born a Dane) in the U.S. The German submarine U-20 sank the Cunard passenger liner, Lusitania, on 05/07/1915, killing 1,198 aboard and, in the process, galvanizing American public opinion squarely against Germany.

Schacht was retroactively given Oregon Architect License #34, when licensing began 11/1919.

Relocation

Emil Schacht was born in Schleswig-Holstein in 1854, when it was still part of Denmark (it reverted to German control in 1864). He studied at a polytechnic school in Copenhagen, Denmark and also in Hanover, Germany, from which he graduated, c. 1872. He came to the U.S. in 1874, and worked in New York, NY, as a draftsman for six years; in that year, he returned to Germany and married in 1880. In 1883, he came back to the U.S., working in Omaha, NE. He made his way to Portland, OR, in 1884, where he opened his own office. He spent the rest of his life in Portland.

Spouse

He married Augusta Schacht (born in Schleswig-Holstein, Denmark, c. 1855) in Germany before 1881.

Children

Emil and Augusta had 6 children, 5 daughters--Gertrude (born in Hamburg, Germany, c. 1884), Rose (born in Portland, OR, c. 1886)--and a son, Martin Albert Jakob Schacht, who became an architect in Portland, OR.

Biographical Notes

According to the 1930 US Census, Schacht owned his own house (with no mortgage) at 171 Vista Avenue in Portland, OR; at that time, he lived with his wife Augusta, his daughter, Gertrude Wagner (who was widowed), daughter Rose Schacht, and a lodger, 58-year-old Louise Schaffer, a Moravian woman. The neighborhood around his house at 171 Vista Avenue had a high concentration of recent Nordic immigrants.

• Portland, OR (Architect's Death)
  Portland, OR

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• Sommerland, Schleswig-Holstein Denmark (Architect's Birth)
  Sommerland, Schleswig-Holstein Denmark

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  Schleswig-Holstein became part of Germany in 1866.

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