Introduction

Most stops have more than one photo, scroll to the left to view them all.

We begin the tour at the intersection of 22nd St. and Goss Cir.

Unlike Boulder’s earliest white settlers, who came as single men--many of them miners—Boulder’s early Black residents primarily came as families. Some came with sufficient funds to purchase houses, while others spent their earliest days in what was called The Jungle, shown in the second photo above, a shantytown south of the railroad tracks that is now the landscaped lawn between the Municipal Building and the library. A notorious Black madame, Mollie Gordon, maintained her establishment in The Jungle although she officially listed her occupation as “laundress.” Often, however, the early Jungle residents moved on to homes of their own.

The homes of early Black citizens were usually small, simple frame what is called “vernacular” architecture. Notably different was the now-demolished brick house of the Lingham family at 2001 Mesa Drive which Frank Lingham, a mason, built himself in 1900. At the time of time of the 1880 census, there were some Black citizens listed living in what became known as the Little Rectangle—a flood prone area of Goss Street between 19th and 23rd streets that included the south side of what is now Canyon Boulevard. In fact, Canyon Boulevard was historically named Water Street because of the propensity of flooding. To appreciate the flood danger, take a look at the third and fourth photos of Goss Street during Boulder’s famous 1894 flood, looking both east and west.

However, most Black families at that time lived throughout and on the edges of the community. Black families typically purchased an existing home instead of building with some notable exceptions including the home of educator and lawyer Ruth Cave Flowers at 2019 Goss Street. Although it was not entirely segregated at any time, the Little Rectangle became increasingly segregated during the 1910s and 1920s when the Ku Klux Klan made an appearance in Boulder County claiming a membership of 2,000 in the city when the total Boulder city population—men, women, and children—was about 11,000. By World War II, the Black population was decreasing, finding better employment opportunities in Denver, with a Latinx population replacing them. In fact, Blacks made up a larger percentage of the total city population in 1910 than they have subsequently.

The social life of early Black citizens focused on their churches. The earliest settlers attended white churches but by 1884 had organized into the Allen Chapel of the African Methodist Episcopal Church at 18th and Pearl streets. In 1908 the Second Baptist Church organized, first meeting in homes, and in the 1940s building the church at 19th Street and Canyon Boulevard. Many of these early Black citizens are buried in the historic Columbia Cemetery. Music was a constant theme as several Black residents became professional or accomplished amateur musicians.

We have chosen some of both the more interesting and representative homes and buildings for your tour. A few have been demolished. In 1948 the Boulder County assessor took photos of all buildings extant at that time, so we have that record and sometimes even older photographs. And this tour is not just about buildings. It is also and perhaps more importantly about the people who lived in them—their families, their experiences, their stories.

The second Stop on the tour is on the southeast corner of 22nd and Goss streets.