Black American West Museum

The Black American West Museum’s “We Tell It Like It Was. . . .” mission is to interpret, display, exhibit, and preserve historical artifacts and documents of African American men, women and children who ventured West as mountain men, miners, cowboys, pioneers, homesteaders and entrepreneurs. Housed in Dr. Justina Ford’s former medical office and home.

The Museum is broken into many diverse exhibits such as our homestead exhibit. This exhibit is primarily dedicated to the town of Dearfield, Colorado. Dearfield was a Black pioneer town founded by O.T. Jackson in 1910 just east of Greeley, Colorado. It was a bustling town of approximately 500 residents founded on the principles of Booker T. Washington. It was successful until the 1930s when depression, drought and dust storms forced most of the residents back to the cities. In the early 1940s, the town dwindled to about a dozen full time residents and finally ended shortly thereafter. The town is now a ghost town and the Museum owns many of the city lots.

In the Cowboy exhibit, there are many items and photographs from famous and not-so-famous Black cowboys. See saddles, spurs, hats, chaps, boots and other cowboy necessities from many of these cowboys. Learn how each of these daily tools of the Black cowboy were used and valued. Did you know that 1 in 3 cowboys were Black?

In the military exhibits, you will see the story of the Buffalo Soldiers. These were the Black military units, both cavalry and infantry, and their stories which were very important to settling of West and beyond. Also, learn about the Tuskegee airmen and their heroics during World War II in their support of our winning war effort. In addition to many photographs and timelines, we have uniforms, saddles, weapons and additional tools of the soldier of the West.
Open Tuesday thru Saturday.

Black American West Museum
3091 California Street
720-242-7428
www.blackamericanwestmuseum.org