Gresham, Oregon is a city in the Portland metropolitan region. It is located directly east (and a little to the south) of Portland. It is Portland's largest suburb, with around 114,000 people compared to the 2020 Census. Like Portland, it is located in Multnomah County. Gresham was incorporated as a city in 1905, and was a small farming town, until sometime after World War II, when the Pacific Northwest region grew rapidly.

One of the problems in writing this is that there are two Greshams---Gresham as a government entity, and Gresham as it exists in the mind of Portlanders. Gresham actually extends northwards from its core region, including a section of I-84 and the Columbia River. But the boundary between Portland and Gresham is mostly just a jagged line along 174th and 162nd Avenues, and most of the time, it isn't apparent to someone if they are in East Portland or in Gresham. So "Gresham" is often used as a vague description for the vast tracts of suburban land that are east of Portland. Also, stereotypically, Gresham was a poorer suburb of Portland, and many times "Gresham" was used as the butt of classist jokes. However, while Gresham is statistically a little poorer than Portland proper, it is a large enough city that it has a diversity of neighborhoods. Although the center of Gresham can indeed resemble a stereotypical low-income suburb, with big box stores, ranch homes and single level apartments, as is often the case, the reality of the community is a bit more complex.

Log in or register to write something here or to contact authors.