12 BOCNEWS.com FEBRUARY 2019 A Legacy Of Courage Thank you for the honor of speaking at this Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day celebration. This is a gathering of my CU Buffalo friends, students and members of the Boulder community. It is a special day for me to be invited by the faith communities of CU and Boulder. It is now 50 plus years after stepping on the CU campus as a student in 1964. I have been asked to give my thoughts about cour- age, growing up Black in Colorado, and whether my experiences at CU and CU Law School were any dif- ferent than the experiences of white, Latino, or Asian students that have attended CU. The topic, a legacy of courage, as it applies to me, is an interesting one. To those that know the his- tory of Dr. MLK, Jr. there is no question that he was a courageous man. He grew up in a time when the law of the land was “separate but equal”. This law mandated by our own U.S. Supreme Court in Plessy v. Ferguson. Dr. King went to segregated schools, traveled on public transportation, and forced to sit in the back of buses and trains, black citizens forced to give up their seats for white citizens, forced to step off a public sidewalk, and walk in the streets when approached by a white person, drank water from separate fountains, suffered firehoses being directed at him during marches, spat on, called the n word by whites, jailed numerous times, stabbed by a knife, and physically threatened with bombings, torture, and death on a daily basis during the length of his life. This was a man of courage and there is no doubt about the courage of Dr. King and his family. In getting ready for this presentation, I re-read Dr. King’s letter from the Birmingham jail, a handwrit- ten letter that he wrote to the clergy in the north and south, from his jail cell in which he was respond- ing to criticism for involving himself in a march in Birmingham, Alabama to protest the rampant and violent segregation practices by the white community against Black citizens. In that letter, Dr. King made statements to inspire courage and conviction from the clergy who sat in the comfort of their churches, synagogues, and parishes while Dr. King languished in jail. Dr. King wrote: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescap- able network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects done directly affects all indirectly.” Dr. King concluded, “I will stay in jail to the end of days before I make a mockery of my conscience” So, everyone who knows the history of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, will say that he was a man of courage. The racism, the separate but equal doctrine of the land, threats of violence, and violence were also a part of my great grandfather, my grandparents, and my parents’ lives, in Missouri and eventually in Colorado. So, today, I will speak about their cour- age and how their courage benefited me, my sister and brother and now my chil- dren. Yes, I am the beneficiary of my family’s courage, their daily struggle to live a better life and to achieve the American dream of a good job, home ownership, and children who are well educated and safe from fear and violence. I am fortunate to be a mem- ber of the Pitts/Scott/Jackson family, one of Colorado’s historic families. My great grandfather, Williams Pitts, was a member of the Great Migration of Black families that migrated from the South to the North and to the West between 1910 and 1960. My great grandfather came to Colorado in 1921 from Jefferson City, Missouri to visit his son who was a World War I veteran who had suffered an injury in Europe fighting and was hospitalized at Fitzimmons Hospital in Denver. He was a carpenter by trade and pur- chased several vacant lots in the North Cherry Creek area. During that time vacant land cost $50 per lot due to their proximity to the Denver City Dump, so the property was not desirable. My great grandfather built several homes on those lots, two for the family and one to rent. He also bought several lots and built several cabins in the historic Lincoln Hills, which was the only Black owned recreational community west of the Mississippi from 1922 to 1965. He was a visionary and a man of courage. Lincoln Hills is only a few miles to the south of Nederland and the Eldora Ski Lodge. During that time lots costs $40 (in a blighted area). In Lincoln Hills, the historic Winks Lodge, where performers such as Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, Lena Horne, writers such as Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes, and activists like Whitney Young, the National Urban League Director would vacation and enjoy the Colorado wilderness in a safe environment. My great grandfather built our family cabin down the road from the historic Wink’s Lodge. Why Lincoln Hills? Why Gilpin County? Why was this county so welcoming to Black families? During that period of time the doctrine of separate but equal existed in Colorado. Black families could not stay in lodging in Estes Park, the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, the Colorado Hotel in Glenwood Springs or the Brown Palace in downtown Denver. Lincoln Hills, Winks Lodge and our cabin, the Zephyr View, were our safe havens, and our American dream. The separate but equal doctrine even applied to our beloved Boulder and CU campus. I started visit- ing Boulder in the 1950’s with my grandmother who knew a Black family who lived on Goss Street. At that time, the Black families in Boulder lived on or near Goss Street. This was Boulder’s form of redlin- ing where Black families were directed by design to a particular street location for housing. My Aunt, Elizabeth Harris Scott, the first of our family to attend CU, graduated from CU in the early 50’s, but could not reside in a CU dormi- tory because of discriminatory policies against Black students but lived with one of Boulder’s black family who rented a room to her. Although CU had President George Norlin who was famous for opposing the KKK, who want- ed no Black, Jewish or Catholic professors and of course, no stu- dents of color, there were still discriminatory practices at CU. The first CU Black basketball player was Billy Lewis in 1958. It took courage for him to make that decision and to come to Boulder. While playing, he was called the N word, called porch monkey and other racial slurs. Yet he persevered, carried himself with dignity, focused on playing and graduated. Billy, a hero of mine, went to Law School, and with me and 5 other Black lawyers in 1971 founded the Sam Cary Bar Association. This past November, my college room- mate Chuck Williams, who played basketball for CU from 1964 to 1968, and one of the first 10 Black bas- ketball players at CU was inducted into CU Sports Hall of Fame. Billy Lewis and Chuck Williams were men of courage, now the team is almost all black. Football fans recently watched the National Championship game between Alabama and Clemson. You may remember in 1957 CU played Clemson in the Orange Bowl. At that time there was controversy over whether the game would be played. Clemson was all white and CU had John Wooten, All American, an African American player. He would go onto fame in the NFL, blocking for the great Jim Brown. The game was played, CU won 27 – 21. Today, we have a new Black football coach, Mel Tucker, half of the players are Black. Mel Tucker is now the second Black head football coach at CU. Times have changed. In 1964, I transferred from the University of Redlands to CU, and living in Andrews Hall in Kittredge Complex. CU had less than 30 Black students. Redlands had only three Black students. II met Chuck Williams whom I just talked about and Sonny Flowers, another Black student. Today, Sonny is a George Norlin Award recipient, the high- est alumni award given to a CU student and the first Black president of the Boulder Bar Association, 100 hundred years after the Bar Association was formed. Sonny is a man of courage. It is a hard road when you the first of anything. I attended CU School of Law in 1967. In my class of 150 there were four women, three Blacks, no Latinos and no Asian students. During my second year in law, 1968 life changed for me and most Americans. Dr. King and Robert Kennedy were assassinated. Shirley Chisholm became the first Black woman elected to the U.S. Congress in New York. I spent the summer in Oakland, California. For me, this was awakening to the Black Power Movement that was coming into prominence from NY to California. I watched the birth of the Black Panther move- ment, the passion of students at Berkeley who were protesting the Viet Nam war and police brutality in the Black neighborhoods of Oakland and Berkeley. I returned to CU Law School with a new direction, fervor and a three inch Afro. That year CU Black students organized and protested over the lack of diversity at CU-Boulder. In the summer of 1969 more than 200 Black and Brown high school stu- dents were admitted to CU campus. We worked on increasing the number of students of color and women at the Law School. The faculty was all white and all male, we worked on increasing the number of minorities and women on the faculty. In 1970 I graduated from CU Law School. By Judge Gary M. Jackson BLACK HISTORY Gary Jackson Continued on Page 14