Honoring a nearly forgotten trailblazer
Lucille Berkeley Buchanan
Though Lucille Berkeley Buchanan was the first African American woman to graduate from the University of Colorado, her name and legacy were nearly lost to CU history.
Thanks to the dogged detective work of a CU professor and the grass-roots support of students and faculty, this trailblazer is being remembered — and honored — with an endowed scholarship and, separately, an undergraduate essay prize.
Seven years ago, someone gave Polly McLean, an associate professor of journalism, a surprising newspaper clipping. The first black woman to graduate from CU had died in 1989 and was buried in an unmarked grave in Denver, it said.
Buchanan’s graduation date was 1918. But the first black woman to graduate from CU had long been identified as Ruth Cave Flowers, who graduated in 1924 and who later overcame significant racial barriers to become a school teacher.
As university archives, genealogical records, property records and other sources confirmed, Buchanan was actually the first, and her life was remarkable in its own right.
Born in 1884 in a mule barn southwest of Denver, Buchanan was the daughter of emancipated Virginia slaves. In 1905, her father built the Queen Anne house in which she spent her later years. It sat on land her mother bought from circus mogul P.T. Barnum.
Buchanan got a teaching certificate in 1905 from the Colorado State College for Education at Greeley. After teaching for a decade, she studied for a year at the University of Chicago. Then she came to CU. So it was that in June 1918, she became the first black woman to earn a degree from CU.
The moment was historic but sad; officials would not let her climb onstage to accept her diploma.
Afterward, she taught in the Chicago Public School system. She retired in 1949 and returned to Denver and the home her father had built. She lived there until she was 103 and died in a nursing home two years later.
Joanne Belknap
Joanne Belknap, a CU sociology professor, heard McLean give a talk on Buchanan. Later, McLean suggested that Belknap set up an endowed scholarship, perhaps in Belknap’s name. As they discussed naming the scholarship, Buchanan’s name came up. McLean said, “great idea.” Belknap donated the first $5,000. But endowing a scholarship requires at least $25,000.
McLean urged others to contribute, and dedicated students set up booths and threw parties to raise the money. In just over a year and a half, McLean and the volunteers raised more than the minimum, often a few dollars at a time.
Belknap is immensely pleased. “I’m really thrilled that she found all these people” to support the scholarship, she says.
The first scholarship is to be awarded this year to a student majoring in women and gender studies who has demonstrated financial need and good academic standing.
Meanwhile, the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages and Literatures has established the Lucile Berkeley Buchanan Undergraduate Essay Prize. The prize honors the fact that Buchanan was a German major, and it carries a $200 prize for the best paper originally written for a CU German class.
Belknap and McLean note that while the scholarship has been endowed, it needs additional support.
For more information, please contact Kimberly Bowman, associate director of development, CU Foundation, at 303-541-1446 or via e-mail at kimberly.bowman@cufund.org.
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