Ghost Town of the Week: January 25th, 2015: Portland

DISCLAIMER: I visited Portland way back in 2005, so this might not be the same today
I visited Portland on one of my first road trips, way back in July 2005. It was the first of many Ghost Towns I visited on the trip, but Portland has virtually no coverage online, so I decided to write about it today. The town is about a mile north of US-166 in southeastern Sumner County, about a mile and a half east of the Kansas Turnpike. The town has apparently been pretty ghostly for quite a while, as its post office closed in 1940! Coming into town from the south, you can tell a town definitely used to be here, but now it just looks... empty.

Portland from the north. The town has been reduced to an old school and grain elevator, 3 or 4 houses (mostly trailers) and a lot of empty treeless lots.

There is still a street network left in the town, although the streets have very generic county names: 145, 146th and 148th St. South and Prairie Road. Looking at a 1902 plat map of the town, none of those names were the original street names. On that 1902 plat map it shows a community with two churches, a train depot, a post office and a few houses, but not much else.
The most notable remnant of the old town is the Guelph Township school.

Portland's old Guelph Township school still appeared to be in good condition in 2005. It might still be used as a community building (for what community there is here).

Behind the school sits a dilapidated outhouse. Note that I am right in the middle of the told town; looking in the background you can tell how empty the old town has become.

A large looming grain elevator sits on the northeast side of town. I don't think it's still in use.

Their old elevator was still in OK condition, but if it's in use at all it's by local farmers.

Across Hydraulic Road is what looks like the scale house for the elevator. This building is definitely not in use anymore. I found it unusual that a major county road would separate a grain elevator and its scale house.

There is no remnant of a business district in the town. There may be 10 people left; a couple of the houses were shabby looking trailers and one large farmstead covers the whole northwest side of town. Looking at Google Maps, something I missed in 2005 was that there are several ruins to the west; I don't know if they're publicly accessible but I found that interesting. It's not that hard to find, so check the town out.