The Port of Portland, 100 miles inland from the Pacific, on the Willamette River near its junction with the Columbia, has an area 10 miles in length and 500 feet in width, and maintains a depth that safely takes care of the heaviest-laden ocean-going vessels. 

Poised at the head of deep-water navigation, this fresh-water harbor serves as a "gateway to the sea lanes and markets of the world," and has an average of five liners clearing its waters daily. Its terminals provide berths for 25 cargo vessels, and new facilities are being built. During its busiest days, following World War II, as many as 50 or 60 ships were accommodated in the harbor at a time. 

Portland, now called the "World Port of the Pacific," has long been the Pacific Coast's leading grain export center; and since 1956, has led all the West Coast ports in total export-import dry cargo tonnage. Fifty steamship lines serve for the harbor; and more than 1,600 ships – flying flags of almost every country – make this their port of call annually.

While the “commercially minded” are greatly interested in the monetary value of the cargo on these ships, the "missionary minded" are concerned about the spiritual values – the souls of men – destined eventually to "put in" at the Eternal Port. We are thankful that aboard many of these ships, the "Bread of Life," given the seamen in the form of little "Gospels" and Christian literature, becomes a part of the outgoing "cargo" dispatched to peoples of all lands.