Commencement

Rain Check? No Way!

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jul 2023 06:00:00 +0000

Rain Check? No Way! Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 07/10/2023 - 00:00

Christie Sounart

LOOK: Commencement

From Wednesday, May 10, to Friday, May 12, a soaker of a storm drenched Boulder with about 2.3 inches of rain. On average, Boulder receives 3.2 inches of rain during the month of May.

The weather didn’t stop ��ƷSM��ӰƬ’s commencement ceremony from happening the morning of Thursday, May 11. The university conferred more than 9,700 degrees in front of an estimated 22,000 supporters. Colorado Gov. Jared Polis served as commencement speaker.

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Photos by Glenn Asakawa, Patrick Campbell, Casey A. Cass

Rain didn't stop CU's commencement ceremony this spring.

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CU Commencement, 1908 to Now

Anonymous — Mon, 11 Jul 2022 06:00:00 +0000

CU Commencement, 1908 to Now Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 07/11/2022 - 00:00

THEN 1908

In 1908, ��ƷSM��ӰƬ graduates braved a windy day to march to Chautauqua Auditorium for their commencement ceremony. They first paraded around campus, then took horse-drawn carriages to Chautauqua to complete the procession. That spring, 146 students graduated from the university.

The traditional Folsom Field commencement tradition began in 1949.

Photo by T.C. Black, Jr/Courtesy ��ƷSM��ӰƬ Heritage Center

NOW May 5, 2022

On May 5, ��ƷSM��ӰƬ was more than ready to host thousands of graduates at the first in-person commencement ceremony since 2019 - and Colorado's signature bluebird sky showed up too.

More than 9,000 degrees were conferred in the Thursday-morning ceremony.

Tom Castello (Jour'87), NBC News' Washington correspondent, delivered the commencement address.

"Never forget this moment, this place" he said. "The place that launched you. ...I never have!"

Photo by Patrick Campbell

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A Family Affair

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Apr 2022 19:55:13 +0000

A Family Affair Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 04/27/2022 - 13:55

Erica Grossman

Before deciding to pursue a PhD, Max Ernst Riedlsperger (PhDHist’69) fell in love with the mountains. After earning his bachelor’s degree at Wabash College and then a master’s at the University of Michigan, the history student from Detroit developed a penchant for the German language. This inevitably led him to spend time honing his language skills in Austria.

“Since I had become so totally enamored with the Alps and intrigued with Austria, I needed to find a university close to the mountains with a good program in Central European History,” said Max. “CU offered both.”

And so he made the decision to move with his wife to Boulder to earn his PhD in history, focusing on modern European, Central and Eastern European, German, Russian and American histories. Max defended his dissertation in August 1969, but by the time of the next official graduation ceremony in June 1970, he was already an assistant professor at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo. Between teaching the last weeks of the spring quarter and grading final exams, there wasn’t enough time to squeeze in a trip to Boulder to attend graduation.

So this year, he’ll be attending the spring commencement ceremony alongside two other recent graduates — his grandchildren, Ben Lemiere (Econ’21) and Emily Lemiere (Comm’22).

Only 13 months apart in age, Ben and Emily have always been close. In high school, when Ben made it clear that he was interested in attending an out-of-state major conference university, his grandfather Max encouraged him to apply at ��ƷSM��ӰƬ.

And then, a year later, Emily followed suit.

“When Emily decided to attend CU — I’m not going to lie, I was a little bummed because I thought she was going to cramp my style,” said Ben. “But, at the end of the day, I’m so happy she made that decision. We became even closer when she arrived on CU’s campus. Our friend groups came together and her roommates are now some of my very best friends.”

For Emily, having her brother on campus helped her adjust to a new environment.

“When I came to CU, I knew absolutely no one,” she said. “So having him there with me made it feel so much more comfortable, and having that little piece of home with me was so special.”

In 2021, Ben graduated with a degree in economics but was unable to participate in CU’s traditional commencement ceremony, which was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, he had a backyard celebration with friends and family. When it became apparent that ��ƷSM��ӰƬ would bring back its spring commencement ceremony in time for Emily’s 2022 graduation, the family had an idea: have all three CU graduates participate in their graduation commencement together.

On Thursday, May 5, Max, Ben and Emily will visit Folsom Stadium together to take part in the 2022 spring commencement ceremony at ��ƷSM��ӰƬ. The multigenerational celebration is a special experience for their close-knit family.

“It’s really hard for me to even put into words what it means to me that all three of us are getting to walk together,” said Emily. “I never thought this would even be an opportunity so it is extremely special. Knowing that my grandfather attended this school in the 1960s and now my brother and I get to obtain degrees here…I feel as though our roots have been planted within this campus. To celebrate this accomplishment together is truly unimaginable.”

After graduation, Emily plans to follow in Max’s footsteps.

“I have always been like my grandfather when it comes to education, so of course I am pursuing another degree,” Emily said.

Next fall, Emily will attend the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University to study sports law and business. She hopes to one day represent female athletes with a long-term dream of starting a non-profit organization.

Meanwhile, Ben is focused on the family business. He manages his parents’ bar in Paso Robles, California, and looks forward to helping them open another location this summer.

As for Max, his plan is to continue enjoying his retirement with his wife Deanna, kids and, of course, his grandchildren.

In the meantime, all three will celebrate their commencement together at the ceremony, followed by a small party at Emily’s house.

Max Riedlsperger and two of his grandchildren will celebrate graduation together this spring.

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Vietnam War Veteran Returns 50 Years Later for Commencement He Missed

Anonymous — Fri, 22 Apr 2022 15:24:45 +0000

Vietnam War Veteran Returns 50 Years Later for Commencement He Missed Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 04/22/2022 - 09:24

Erica Grossman

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpTKImTk6b4&t=5s&ab_channel=UniversityofColoradoBoulder]

In 1968, Frank Webb (PolSci’68) earned a degree from ��ƷSM��ӰƬ but didn’t lay eyes on the diploma until 1971, when he returned home after serving in the Vietnam War. More than 50 years later, Webb is headed to Folsom Field Stadium to participate in something the war prevented him from doing in the 1960s — attending a commencement ceremony. At 76 years old, he’ll make the trip from his home near Snohomish, Washington, back to Boulder to celebrate alongside the Class of 2022.

“I’ve been back to campus a number of times as my heart is at home in Boulder,” said Webb. “But this time will be special for me, special like no other.”

Webb grew up in a family of six who followed his father’s career across the country until they settled in Englewood, Colorado. It was there, at Englewood High School, that teachers inspired him to pursue a life of learning along with his mom’s repeated encouragement to enroll in college. After initial semesters at Iowa State University and CU Denver, Webb made the shift to Boulder.

“A few unofficial visits to ��ƷSM��ӰƬ made me fall in love with the campus — the open air of Boulder and the vibrant student body, which included some of my classmates from Englewood High School,” he said.

And so, in 1965, he enrolled, majoring in political science with a minor in sociology. During his senior year, he even dabbled with a couple of 4000-level law classes, which instilled in him a deep respect for American law and its history.

“Many brilliant people and great instructors at CU gave profound meaning to my experience of a college education,” said Webb. “And I was always deeply involved in the fine thinking — and debate — of my peers. I never missed a single CU football home game at Folsom Stadium; after all, season football tickets for CU students were $6!”

Drafted for Service

But it was also during this time of passionate studies and weekend football that the Vietnam War and America’s military involvement in it escalated. While demonstrations and student protests took hold on the ��ƷSM��ӰƬ campus, Webb devoted his time and energy to his studies. Webb finished his senior year just when a notice arrived at his parents’ house directing him to report for service. When recalling what he felt when learning that he would be drafted to serve in the U.S. military during the war, Webb summed it up: “Fear, fear and more fear.”

"I woke up one day and realized that attending commencement, taking the walk … simply have deep, inexplicable meaning to me."

Despite his trepidation, Webb reported for duty and learned to enjoy the physical conditioning of Army Basic Training and subsequent armorer training. Then, in March 1969, he was deployed to Ban Me Thuot, Cam Ranh Bay and Ho Chi Minh City (then known as Saigon) in Vietnam. It was early in his deployment that his affiliation with CU helped him serve in a different capacity. While in the group shower facility, a fellow serviceman noticed Webb’s CU class ring. Webb told him about his studious background at CU — including the political science and English composition courses he’d taken — all of which prompted a fortuitous suggestion: apply for a job as editor of The Crusader, a military newspaper for the 35th Group.

Webb got the job and improved the quality of stories and editorial direction for the paper — a position that allowed him to stay further removed from jungle combat. But the position wasn’t without danger. As part of improving the publication, he worked with a mapmaking facility 40 miles away to shift the paper from mimeograph to offset printing, complete with professional photography of engineering functions and copy from Stars & Stripes, the official military news service. This required flying, building roads and traveling Vietnam by Jeep.

“One sniper’s bullet missed me by no more than 10 feet,” Webb recalled. “No one is ever safe in a combat zone.”

Frank Webb in Vietnam.

Life after Vietnam

After completing his service, Webb returned to the U.S. and got married (he and his wife Colleen just celebrated 47 years of marriage). Together, they settled in Washington and raised a special needs daughter, fostered a child from an abusive home and adopted another girl. Webb reignited his love of learning, taking a series of computer programming and accounting courses to help lay the foundation of a decades-long career in communication engineering and programming. Though retired, at age 76 Webb still works as a bus driver for a large school district north of Seattle.

“I find it enjoyable, even when jousting mentally with middle-school kids who come to the task mentally unarmed, driven only by peer pressure and hormones,” he said. “I knew all that psychology and sociology would come in handy someday.”

After a busy life of family and work, Webb decided that 2022 would be the year that he finally returned to the ��ƷSM��ӰƬ campus to take part in the lifetime milestone he missed decades before — commencement.

“I’ve been hustling to keep working, and I woke up one day and realized that attending commencement, taking the walk … simply have deep, inexplicable meaning to me,” he said.

Webb will take part in the Class of 2022 spring commencement ceremony on Thursday, May 5, in honor of his mother and daughter.

“I want to complete the promise I made to my mother, though she’s passed, and to show my adopted daughter that, yeah, commencement has meaning to the mind and the soul, representing on a piece of bond paper the effort, the study, the joy of discovery — that ‘aha’ moment repeated many times, culminating in ceremony and celebrating the achievement that says, ‘I did it.’”

After walking in his cap and gown, Webb will take part in one more longstanding Boulder tradition — trekking to The Sink to celebrate with his wife.

Photos courtesy Frank Webb

Frank Webb earned his degree in 1968.

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Affinity Graduations 2022

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Mar 2022 07:00:00 +0000

Affinity Graduations 2022 Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 03/11/2022 - 00:00

During her senior year in 2012, Kalee Salazar (EnvSt, EthnSt’12) participated in the revived American Indian graduation in the backyard of the Koenig Alumni Center. It was co-hosted by the CU Center for Native American and Indigenous Studies (CNAIS) and Forever Buffs American Indian group leadership team. A local Native American drum group recognized them with an honor song, and each received a commemorative blanket.

Every year since, the graduation has occurred. The group hopes to celebrate in person this spring.

“When a Native Buff graduates, it is an accomplishment for the entire [Native American] community at CU,” said Salazar, who lives in Santa Fe and works for the state of New Mexico’s Indian Affairs Department.

This May, five other Forever Buffs clubs, in partnership with the Alumni Association, also will host affinity graduations. Each group — Black, LatinX, American Indian, Veterans, Lavender and Silver Buffs Marching Band— will receive specialty graduation stoles to recognize their identities, and each ceremony will feature cultural traditions to celebrate the students’ achievements.
Find out more.

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Photo by ��ƷSM��ӰƬ Alumni Association

In May, the Alumni Association will host several affinity graduations.

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Commencement 2020

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Jun 2020 17:07:00 +0000

Commencement 2020 Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 06/01/2020 - 11:07

Last May, ��ƷSM��ӰƬ grabbed headlines with the “Snowmencement” of 2019. Sunglasses and sandals were swapped with ski goggles and boots. The high was 39 degrees.

This spring, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the university replaced the in-person ceremony with a live-streamed event on May 16.

The conferral of degrees, reading of the Norlin Charge and recognition of outstanding graduates proceeded as usual. Hardcore History podcaster Dan Carlin (Hist’89) gave remarks in the annual commencement address. Individual colleges and departments further recognized the milestone with their own virtual celebrations.

Eleanor Alicea (StComm’20) viewed the ceremony in her Boulder home with her three other graduating roommates. Courtney Kauffman (ArchEngr, PreMed’20) watched in her parents’ living room with her brother and fiancé. Both participated in their individual college’s events.

“Although I am disappointed that I cannot have the full graduation experience in person with all of my classmates, I am happy that CU was able to adapt and still find a way to honor the Class of 2020,” said Alicea. “I plan to still hold my head high as I celebrate all of my accomplishments from my four years at CU.”

And we thought the Snowmencement of 2019 was unusual

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Class of 2020 Spotlight: Josh Ney

Anonymous — Thu, 30 Apr 2020 18:29:34 +0000

Class of 2020 Spotlight: Josh Ney Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 04/30/2020 - 12:29

Josh Ney (Fin, Mgmt'20) was born and raised in the small mountain town of Coal Creek Canyon, Colorado. During his freshman year at ��ƷSM��ӰƬ, Josh joined the Herd Leadership Council. He since has held multiple leadership positions on the council, including business relations chair and executive advisor. Josh also has served as president of CU's student government, executive board member of Leeds' student government and chair of the Council of Colleges and Schools, to name a few.

Josh helped execute The Herd's migration to a dues-free organization and played a critical role in the expansion of the Leadership Council from 11 to 23 student leaders. At student Alumni Association events, he was the first to show up (always wearing a Herd shirt), and the first to crack a joke when things became too serious.

We sat down with Josh over Zoom to hear more about his time at CU and what is next for him.

What are some highlights from your CU experience?

I have been very fortunate to have had many opportunities and have learned a ton from my experiences. Leading the legislative branch of student government was an incredible leadership experience and I learned so much about how organizations work, conflict resolution and representation. Another highlight was on the Herd Leadership Council — I was able to establish connections between the Alumni Association and local Boulder businesses by working directly with companies to create partnerships that would benefit students. A final highlight is serving as a Leeds Ambassador to share my experiences with incoming students and show them why CU is a great place to go to college.

You gained a great depth of knowledge about this institution’s inner workings. Do you have any points of reflection to share about ��ƷSM��ӰƬ?

Having the privilege of meeting many university staff, administrators and faculty, one thing I always enjoyed is how much they all care for students. Each has a role to play at the university, but the core value driving these people is the students. The school also has so many resources for students, ranging from personal well-being to a vast wealth of knowledge students can dive into. It is quite amazing to have been able to take advantage of these resources while I have been here, and I wish I had more time as there are a ton more things I never had the chance to do.

What makes you the most excited about being a Class of 2020 Buff?

Being a Class of 2020 Buff is definitely a special thing and I am excited to join a network of hundreds of thousands of people who have gone through the same university, yet have had completely unique experiences. Despite the current circumstances and disappointment of not being able to walk with my fellow graduates, I am looking forward to life beyond this pandemic. It will be an odd time to transition between phases in our lives, but I know we will make it through and come out stronger on the other side.

What’s next for you after leaving ��ƷSM��ӰƬ?

After graduating, I plan to spend the summer hiking and backpacking and aspire to finish all of Colorado’s majestic fourteeners. Come August, I am extremely excited to start my career as a financial analyst at a large aerospace company, and am extremely grateful to CU for preparing me with all I need to begin the next phase of my life there.

What are two interesting things we should know about you?

I am an avid lover of the outdoors and my passions revolve around hiking, snowboarding, climbing and just enjoying nature. I really enjoy college as it provides a platform for me to learn and I hope to continue learning as long as I live.

Josh served on the CU Herd Leadership Council and as president of CU's student government.

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Social Buffs — Summer 2018

Anonymous — Fri, 01 Jun 2018 21:00:00 +0000

Social Buffs — Summer 2018 Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 06/01/2018 - 15:00

At Commencement 2018, 6,063 bachelor’s degrees, 1,487 master’s degrees, 199 law degrees and 414 doctoral degrees were awarded to students who finished in fall 2017 and spring and summer 2018. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (EnvCon’81) delivered the address. “Once I toured this campus, I was hooked,” she told the Folsom Field crowd on Thursday, May 10. “I couldn’t see past the Flatirons.”

Photo by Casey A. Cass

Student excitement surrounding Commencement 2018.

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CU Around: Seniors

Anonymous — Fri, 01 Jun 2018 16:00:00 +0000

CU Around: Seniors Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 06/01/2018 - 10:00

Grad Bash

On May 3, nearly 3,000 graduating seniors celebrated the end of the spring semester during Grad Bash, an annual farewell celebration hosted by the ��ƷSM��ӰƬ Alumni Association at Koenig Alumni Center.

Some students were soon heading for faraway places, such as the Virgin Islands or London. Some were staying in Boulder. All stood on the threshold of something new.

At the event’s Career Services booth, students wrote their future employers on whiteboards and posed for photos. Companies with incoming Buffs include Lockheed Martin, Charles Schwab and Comcast NBC Universal. Other students were heading directly into graduate programs at Cornell, Columbia, Stanford and, of course, ��ƷSM��ӰƬ. The Game of Life-themed party included free food, drinks, prizes and the opportunity to sign a gigantic “Class of 2018” banner that would hang under the Forever Buffs archway at Commencement.

A week later, on May 10, the university awarded more than 8,000 degrees to graduates of the fall 2017 and spring and summer 2018 classes. Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (EnvCon’81) delivered the main address.

In Brief:

A week before Commencement 2018, nearly 3,000 seniors attended Grad Bash, the Alumni Association’s annual backyard
send-off party.
A rainy morning gave way to sunshine for the entire event for ��ƷSM��ӰƬ’s newest Forever Buffs.

Photo by Patrick Campbell

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Lucile

Anonymous — Fri, 01 Jun 2018 15:05:00 +0000

Lucile Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 06/01/2018 - 09:05

Clint Talbott

Long overlooked, the first Black woman to graduate from the University of Colorado comes alive in a new book by ��ƷSM��ӰƬ’s Polly McLean.

In the narrow columns of newspaper type, Polly McLean sensed a bigger story. A story with layers of triumph, heartbreak and betrayal that revealed hard truths about the history of the University of Colorado and America itself.

For decades, ��ƷSM��ӰƬ’s official history recorded that the first Black woman to graduate from the university, Ruth Cave Flowers (A&S’24), earned her degree in 1924. But in 2001 McLean learned from an old newspaper report that the first had actually graduated in 1918. Her name was Lucile Berkeley Buchanan Jones (Ger1918), and she’d lived to age 105.

By the time McLean, a ��ƷSM��ӰƬ media studies professor, read the Rocky Mountain News story, it was nearly a decade old. And yet Lucile remained obscure, even at CU.

CU’s first Black woman graduate finally received the respect due her thanks to the dogged work of McLean, a fellow CU pioneer.

“That set me on this journey,” McLean, the campus’ first tenured Black woman, said at the inaugural Lucile Berkeley Buchanan Lecture in April.

Over the next decade, McLean exhumed Lucile’s story, fragment by elusive fragment, elevating her to her rightful place in CU’s history. In a book to be published this summer, Remembering Lucile: A Virginia Family’s Rise from Slavery and a Legacy Forged a Mile High (University of Colorado Press), McLean brings Lucile to life and corrects the record in painstaking, at times painful, detail.

McLean’s work also led ��ƷSM��ӰƬ to make a public gesture of atonement for a searing act of bigotry 100 years ago, when Lucile was barred from walking across the Macky Auditorium stage to receive her degree. At Commencement 2018, the university invited McLean to accept Lucile’s diploma, a move Chancellor Philip P. DiStefano called “long overdue.”

The symmetry was striking and poignant: CU’s first Black woman graduate finally received the respect due her thanks to the dogged work of McLean, a fellow CU pioneer.

Child of Slaves

The daughter of emancipated slaves, Lucile Berkeley Buchanan was born in 1884 in Denver. Her family lived on land purchased from P.T. Barnum, the circus mogul and cynic known for his “sucker born every minute” quip.

Lucile became the first person in her family to graduate from not one, but two, Colorado universities: In 1905, she was the first African American to graduate with a two-year degree from what now is the University of Northern Colorado.

After a long career as a school teacher, mainly in Arkansas and Illinois, she lived in Denver until her death in 1989, when she was interred in an unmarked grave.

Lucile entered Polly McLean’s life in 2001, as McLean researched an assignment she’d given her women’s studies class: Uncovering the history of Black women in Boulder.

During a visit to the CU Heritage Center in Old Main, McLean read a 1993 Rocky Mountain News article about her that carried the arresting headline “She was CU’s first Black female grad: A pioneer buried without a headstone.”

The paper quoted Doris and Larry Harris, who had purchased Lucile’s Denver home after the state of Colorado forced her into a nursing home. The Harrises noted that they’d bought the home, a mini Queen Anne on Raleigh Street, for $70,000. They wondered why the estate hadn’t yielded enough money for a headstone. (A stone Lucile had purchased for herself long before her death had been destroyed, and it appears the publicly appointed conservator of the estate didn’t order a new one.)

The Rocky also quoted a CU spokeswoman saying the university would correct its records to reflect Lucile’s status as CU’s first Black woman graduate. But eight years after the story ran, the records were still inaccurate.

By the time McLean was on the case, the Harrises had divorced and moved, taking with them boxes of memorabilia Lucile had left behind. But, in bits and pieces, with tenacity and cajolery, McLean fashioned a compelling portrait.

If They Knock You Down

Lucile Berkeley Buchanan Jones’ story is part triumph, part tragedy.

One of her sisters, Laura, committed suicide in 1899 while attempting to become a teacher. The Rocky covered the story under the headline “Color discrimination drove a girl to suicide.”

Lucile, too, faced discrimination. She had applied for her first teaching job in 1905 in a company coal town in Huerfano County, Colo. She didn’t get the position, despite the work of a newspaper editor who condemned the racial prejudice thwarting her. So, Lucile left Colorado and taught in Little Rock and Hot Springs, Ark.

In 1915 she enrolled at the University of Chicago, studying German, Greek and British poetry. Returning to Colorado, she continued with German at CU. “The Black intelligentsia at the end of the 19th and into the early decades of the 20th century viewed Germany as a ‘spiritual fatherland,’” McLean writes.

Her story is part triumph, part tragedy.

Also, Lucile knew the work of W.E.B. Du Bois, the sociologist, historian and activist who had studied in Berlin and had an affinity for Germany. Du Bois argued that Black people needed a liberal arts education to battle racial inequality.

By spring 1918 — six years after Charles Durham Campbell (Math 1912) became CU’s first African American graduate — Lucile had earned a CU degree, too. Her mother, two sisters and a niece traveled to campus for commencement, held in Macky Auditorium. There were 168 members in the class. Lucile was the lone African American. But she was never called to the stage to receive her diploma. Administrators instead sent a classmate to slip it to her offstage.

Embittered, Lucile vowed never to return to campus, and never did.

After taking a job as a teacher in Kansas City, she married John Dotha Jones in 1926 and took his name. Within a decade he’d abandoned her. She filed for divorce, claiming he’d committed adultery and been cruel and habitually drunk.

Lucile later told friends and family he’d been killed in a duel. In fact, McLean writes, Jones died in 1965, after living with another man for 22 years in a home they purchased together.

In 1937 Lucile again returned to school, enrolling in graduate studies in English literature at the University of Chicago. She was 53.

Lucile lived to be 105 years old.

She retired from teaching in 1949 and returned to Denver to live in the home built by her father, the former slave who became a teamster and street commissioner.

There she lived until she was 103, when Colorado Adult Protective Services deemed her a danger to herself and forcibly placed her in a nursing home. Lucile was blind and had no family willing or able to help. A court-appointed conservator sold her home and paid her bills.

Even in old age and confined to the nursing home, Lucile was a dutiful citizen. The Rocky interviewed her and other centenarian voters in 1988, when she was 104.

A lifelong Republican, Lucile told the Rocky that Franklin D. Roosevelt was the only Democrat she might have supported, because, “Over the years as I look back, there were many good things he did for the people.”

As for her loyalty to the GOP, Lucile said: “Lincoln was a Republican. That’s all I need to know.”

Much of the historical material McLean unearthed came from dogged investigative reporting, which involved poring over musty public records and interviewing people around the country. Key information came from old newspapers, including Black newspapers.

It was a newspaper story that helped ensure a headstone now carries her name. In 1993 Frederick John Walsen (Jour’39), grandson of the founder of Walsenburg, Colo., read the Rocky article that ultimately alerted McLean to Lucile. Walsen, who died in 2000, arranged and paid for Fairmont Cemetery in Denver to add her name to an existing family headstone.

It reads: “Lucile B. Jones, June 13, 1884 — Nov. 10, 1989 — First Black Woman Graduate University of Colorado.”

Photo courtesy the Buchanan Archives/Book jacket courtesy University of Colorado Press

Long overlooked, the first black woman to graduate from the University of Colorado comes alive in a new book by ��ƷSM��ӰƬ’s Polly McLean.

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Commencement

Rain Check? No Way!

LOOK: Commencement

Related Articles

CU Commencement, 1908 to Now

THEN 1908

NOW May 5, 2022

Related Articles

A Family Affair

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Vietnam War Veteran Returns 50 Years Later for Commencement He Missed

Drafted for Service

Life after Vietnam

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Affinity Graduations 2022

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Commencement 2020

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Class of 2020 Spotlight: Josh Ney

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Social Buffs — Summer 2018

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CU Around: Seniors

Grad Bash

In Brief:

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Lucile

Child of Slaves

If They Knock You Down

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