Nicki Gonzales is the Colorado state historian, a history professor and vice provost at Regis University, and a Colorado native.
She is particularly interested in uncovering and telling the stories of communities that have been overlooked in mainstream historical narratives, especially the Latino, Chicano, and Hispanic communities across Colorado and the broader American West.
She described aspects of Colorado’s origin story to a full house, which included her parents, during a presentation at the American Legion Post #119’s Anniversary Lecture Series Monday night.
Gonzales specializes in the history of the American West with a focus on race relations and social and political movements. Her research interests include the land-grant movements in Southern Colorado and the experience of Chicano Vietnam veterans. She’s also a mom and coach to her two half-Irish sons, Danny and Teddy.
She was asked how she became the state historian.
“I have been active with History Colorado since 2012, and in 2018, they asked me to serve on what was then a new State Historians Council, which is a group of five historians from different parts of the state,” she said. Those five choose the state historian.
She crammed several semesters’ worth of study into a fast presentation of the state’s history, beginning with a look at its Indigenous peoples.
“Colorado has a very long Indigenous history,” said Gonzales. It has been home to about 52 different tribes.
When you think of Colorado’s history, you think of Native Americans. But she asked the audience, who don’t you think of? African Americans and Chinese, Japanese, and Irish immigrants also played a part in the state’s history, some of which is shameful in terms of mistreatment of minorities.
A westward and northern migration added to the existing Indigenous populations in the state.
“We often talk about westward migration, but we also have to talk about those who came from the south into the north.”
The Spanish Empire controlled much of what is now the southwestern United States and Mexico from the 1500s to about 1810, when Mexico declared its independence from Spain.
This Spanish territory was controlled by the Spanish crown, which handed out land grants to loyal subjects.
Gonzales said today’s city of Santa Fe was founded in 1609, about the same time as Jamestown on the East Coast.
Between 1821 and 1848, parts of Colorado belonged to Mexico.
But the mid-1800s were marked by a philosophy of Manifest Destiny, the idea that Americans were destined to settle the West, all the way to the Pacific.
“Americans felt it was their God-given duty and their right to move west and conquer the Indigenous peoples and Spanish-speaking peoples of this region, and to declare it American territory,” she said.
This was also the time leading up to the Gold Rush. The Mexican-American War ended in 1848, and the next year, hordes of people began moving westward to find gold.
In response, Mexico began awarding land grants to lure people from the south to create a northern buffer. These land-grant communities in southern Colorado, some tiny villages, kept their identities through the years, she said, and held spiritual significance for their residents.
Gonzales talked about the Native Americans, the Spanish, and the Mexicans who made up Colorado, and she also spoke about the people who built Colorado.
Heavy industries like steel, coal, mining, and agriculture attracted immigrants from all over the world. These were not the elites in history but hard-scrabble workers.
“So one of the points that I want to leave you with is the fact that the federal government passed laws and provided support to enable these industries to be successful in the West, and historians often refer to the American West as a colony of the Northeast.”
For instance, the Mining Act of 1874 prioritized mineral rights above all else. And the Railroad Act of 1862 provided low-interest loans and land grants to railroad companies that wanted to build a railroad through the West. J. P. Morgan received a huge grant from the federal government for his Great Northern Railroad.
The Homestead Act of 1862 provided 160 acres of land to any American who applied for it. This was a way to encourage people to move West.
“This is part of Colorado’s origin story,” she said.
Ranching and farming then required workers and immigrants, who came from the American South, from Mexico and Latin America, and as refugees from the Dust Bowl.
Irish, Mexican, and Chinese workers became part of the railroad labor force. African Americans arrived in Colorado after the Civil War to escape Jim Crow discrimination.
Gonzales said the state’s attitude toward Mexicans changes with the need.
“It’s like a revolving door: We want you, we don’t want you.”
In the 1880s, Mexicans were recruited to work on the railroads and in agriculture. And after the Mexican Revolution, more people came north.
Members of her family traveled north in the 1920s to settle in Colorado.
“This is a time of restriction of European immigration. A lot of people don’t realize that the United States banned or greatly slowed immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe.” Catholics, Jews, and those with darker skin were not welcome.
“So there’s all these contradictions in American immigration history,” she said.
One of the more successful immigration programs, the Bracero Program, lasted from 1942 to 1964.
“An agreement between President Roosevelt and the Mexican government brought guest workers into the country,” she said. “About 5 million Mexicans were guest workers from 1942 until President Lyndon Johnson ended the program in 1964.”
Gonzales said the attacks on Sept. 11 completely upended any effort at immigration reform.
A shameful part of Colorado’s history involves the spread of the Ku Klux Klan. The first KKK emerged after the Civil War in the 1860s. It was active for decades, and then the second Klan was founded in 1915 in Georgia.
The headquarters of that second Klan revival moved to Indiana. Indiana was the hotbed of Klan activity, but close behind was Colorado.
“And it’s pretty well known that in Denver business circles, you couldn’t really get ahead unless you were a member of the Klan,” she added.
World War II completely remade the state physically, demographically, and economically.
Rural-to-urban migration occurred as people from across the country looked for jobs in industries like the Gates Rubber Co. and the Remington Arms Factory. Colorado cities began to grow.
“I always tell my students, you don’t have to watch Netflix, you don’t have to go on YouTube. If you want to be entertained, read history. It has it all, right?”
Upcoming programs in the America Legion’s Anniversary Lecture Series include:
- 9/11 & The Global War on Terror, Monday, Sept. 7, from 5 to 7 p.m.
- World War I and the Interwar Period, presented by Laurie Button, Monday, Sept. 21, from 5 to 7 p.m.
- World War II, the Cold War, and Beyond, followed by Vietnam and America’s 1960s, Monday, Oct. 19, from 5 to 7 p.m.
- Capstone – The Fabric of America, Monday, Nov. 2, from 5 to 7 p.m.
The lectures are free and open to the public.