University of Portland

The first institution located on Waud's Bluff was Portland University, which was established by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1891. Amid financial setbacks following the Panic of 1893, Portland University vacated the Bluff Campus to hold classes from 1896 to 1897 in East Portland where it was joined temporarily by the recently insolvent College of Puget Sound.

According to University of Portland tradition, Archbishop Alexander Christie, the head of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon, saw a large building on the bluff from aboard a ship on the nearby Willamette River. He learned that it was called West Hall and had been unoccupied for several years since the closure of Portland University.

The Archdiocese purchased West Hall  and the surrounding campus with financial assistance from the Congregation of Holy Cross, and named the new institution Columbia University after the nearby Columbia River. The university opened its doors to 52 young men on September 5, 1901, with eight Roman Catholic priests from the local archdiocese serving as professors. At the request of the archbishop, the Congregation of the Holy Cross assumed ownership of the university in 1902.