The Negro’s past can never be forgotten; his present is being carefully observed, and his future is yet to be made.
– Charles Birdwhistle, former African American resident of Fort Collins, 1899

Black migration to the American West accelerated significantly in the 20th century as individuals and families sought opportunities for self-determination beyond the Jim Crow South. In many western communities, Black families found greater freedom in urban and rural enclaves where families joined early Black pioneers and established a shared sense of community and protection. In Black farming colonies such as Nicodemus, Kansas, and Dearfield, Colorado, and in urban neighborhoods established in bigger cities such as Topeka, Kansas City, and Denver, Black Americans left Southern states to form new communities that afforded more freedom and good-paying jobs. However, they were still subject to the nation’s widespread racism. They also established neighborhoods in smaller towns and cities such as Fort Collins in response to labor demands in mining, beet sugar production, the service industries, and other job sectors. In every aspect of life in the American West, from the military to business to religious worship to community activism, Black Americans faced endemic racism but continued to fight for and win respect for their labor, their professional expertise, their influential talent, and their contributions to American culture and society.

Black newspapers in Denver celebrated professional and educational achievements, entertainment, the state’s many all-Black baseball teams, and the social activities of Black residents in every town, as well as providing vital information neglected in local newspapers about discrimination around the state. Black professionals and business owners grew in number, as did the middle class made up of barbers, waiters, and porters. Some members of Colorado’s white citizenry continuously challenged this progress. The Ku Klux Klan, America’s most notorious white supremacist organization, had strong membership in Colorado during the early 1900s and sponsored recruitment rallies and other public events from Denver to Fort Collins, which set the stage for Klan member Clarence Morley’s election as Governor of Colorado from 1925 to 1927.

The legacy of this discrimination remains alongside the individual stories of success. Because Black lives were often forced to the margins, our official historical record frequently obscures their stories and the places associated with their lives. As a result, Black historic sites are far less recognized than the sites associated with the white community, and in many cases, have been lost to redevelopment and urban renewal projects. Below, we explore this legacy in Fort Collins.

Despite its small size, the Black community in Fort Collins reflected the same optimism for growth and more permanent security that was found in the city as a whole. Society column entries in Denver’s Black newspapers reflect a social network along the Front Range that was interdependent, mobile, and growing. Fort Collins included several families who were part of that network and committed to expanding their collective presence in northern Colorado. The Clay family was among the most prominent, long-standing of these families in early Fort Collins. Charley Clay arrived in Colorado in 1864 as a cook accompanying a military detachment sent to the Overland stage station at Fort Latham several miles southeast of Greeley. He arrived in Laporte the following year, where he found work as a barber and cook. Although not appearing in the 1880 census, Clay was well-known in the Fort Collins area by 1882 as a caterer and cook. Charles and his wife, Anna, had seven children. The Clay home at 317 Maple, believed to have been located along a mid-block alley west of Washington Park, was the center of Black social life in Larimer County during the early 1900s. Out of his home, Charley Clay ran the Colored Mission, which became the Zion Baptist Church, and ministered to Black families throughout the region. His son, Charles Clay, Jr., established a home just to the north at 321 Maple. The Clays hosted visitors and entertainers and meetings and important social gatherings, such as the local chapter of the Paul Laurence Dunbar Literary Society, a national organization named for the famous Black poet that discussed contemporary social and political issues.3 In his later years, Charley, Sr. worked for the city as the “scavenger,” removing disposed items and trash that accumulated on public streets due to lack of waste removal services. Most of the large Clay family had dispersed to other communities or had passed away by the time the family patriarch was laid to rest in Grandview Cemetery in 1910. Charles Jr.’s wife, Nellie Clay, was the last family member on record living at 321 Maple. She lived in the home in 1919 while working as a janitor at the Empress and Lyric Theaters, but by 1920, she had moved away.

 Although they only lived in Fort Collins for a very short time, the McDaniels are the most widely known Black family in early Fort Collins history. Henry and Susan McDaniel moved with their children from Wichita to Denver, and for a brief time just after the turn of the 20th century the family lived in Fort Collins at 317 Cherry Street while Henry worked locally as a teamster. Henry and Susan were gospel singers, he was also an itinerant Baptist preacher, and several of their children grew up to be talented performers. While they lived on Cherry Street, their young daughter, Hattie McDaniel, attended the Franklin School at Howes & Mountain. Hattie is most remembered for being the first Black American to win an Academy Award, for her 1939 role in Gone with the Wind. She is also recognized for her civil rights activism as a participant in the groundbreaking 1945 “Sugar Hill” lawsuit that ended restrictive racial covenants in her Los Angeles neighborhood.

Other Black families moved into homes farther west, such as the Goodalls and Birdwhistles. By 1909, Andrew and Edith Goodall, and their son James were living at 131 [North] Mack Street. Edith Goodall became active in the local chapter of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, a key women’s suffrage organization, and hosted a chapter meeting in their parlor. The Goodalls eventually left Fort Collins to join the pioneer Weld County community of Dearfield, a Black-owned agricultural colony. Some families, like the Clays, found opportunity in smaller communities, while others, like the McDaniels, found the larger Black community in Denver, or the exclusively Black community of Dearfield, to be more attractive for their family’s future. In several cases, despite the limitations of segregation and racism, these local families were able to invest in real estate, purchase automobiles to increase their independent mobility, and provide educational and social opportunities for their children that served their ambitions to build financial security and professional success. to be more attractive for their family’s future.

Despite these opportunities, one of the key challenges faced by Black Americans who were newcomers to the West, or simply visiting, was identifying and negotiating the boundaries of informal and legalized segregation, economic discrimination, and racism. Some Black families, such as Charlie and Mamie Birdwhistle, helped navigate those boundaries by providing advocacy and safe places to lodge and visit. The Birdwhistles also moved into west Fort Collins on Oak Street and used their residence to provide social gatherings and church services for the Black community as well as a place for travelers to stay when visiting Larimer County. Although never listed in the Negro Motorist Green Book, records show the Birdwhistles regularly hosted musicians who came to the city to entertain local white audiences but were not welcome in local hotels. Charlie Birdwhistle was also a respected pastor of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, but the community was unable to amass enough resources and momentum to overcome the barriers to creating a permanent church location in Fort Collins. Without this important central feature of the Black community, it was more difficult for that community to grow. At the same time, white supremacist organizations like the Klan continued activities in Fort Collins, including rallies at the America Theater on North College Avenue, participation in Colorado Agricultural College events, and a cross-burning in City Park in 1925. With limited employment opportunities, few options for religious worship, and still-rampant racism, many families like the Lyles moved to urban areas by the 1940s for better jobs, larger church congregations, and safer neighborhoods.

The persistence of housing discrimination motivated students to create the Black Student Alliance (BSA). Founded by students like Paul Chambers, Trudi Morrison, and Meredith Springs in 1968, the BSA allied itself with the Mexican American Committee for Equality (MACE) and began pressuring the University administration to improve conditions. This included combatting housing discrimination off-campus, but also recruiting more Black students, administrators, and faculty, to help make the university more representative of the state community it served. This pressure included protests and sit-ins, including demonstrations on the lawn of CSU President William Morgan’s residence at 645 S. Shields Street on April 9, 1969, and demonstrations at the Lory Student Center and Old Main administrative building that month. The climax of demonstrations came in 1970 when students led by the BSA protested the CSU-BYU basketball game in Moby Arena over the exclusion of Black Americans from the clergy of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS, or Mormons). Many students held signs referencing solidarity with the Wyoming Fourteen, fourteen Black members of the Wyoming Cowboys football team dismissed by head coach Lloyd Eaton for requesting to wear black armbands in protest of BYU at their scheduled 1969 game. The protests met with mixed success; the University began working on student demands focused on improved student recruitment, university hiring, and exposure of all students to Black history and culture. These efforts resulted in the establishment of ethnic studies programs at the University, and the creation of the Black Student Union, now known as the Black/African American Cultural Center. However, student and employee recruitment remained a persistent problem.

Special thanks from the Historic Preservation Services division for the research support of David North, Rebekah Schields, Ben Warner, and Lesley Struc.