Clara Brown is celebrated as a great Colorado community leader, a pioneer and, most of all, her welcoming spirit.
She’s said to have been the first black woman to arrive at Colorado’s gold rush. Her story, of being a freed slave who helped other former slaves resettle in Colorado, is one that Eleise Clark wants to continue to tell.
Clark is a black history re-enactor and regularly plays the storied Brown, who was freed by her third owner in 1859, for the Jane Taylor Re-enactors Guild — an acting group associated with the The Black American West Museum, located in Denver.
“You put on that period piece and you get kind of transformed,” she said. “It’s almost like an out of body experience in a way.”
The actors most often have to put a lot of research into their acting work. It’s a part of the role Clark said she’s enjoyed most about being with the guild.
“I enjoy what I do, I enjoy history — getting the word out about the history of America,” said Clark, who’s worked with the museum for more than 30 years. “Not many people know about the contributions of people of color in the west.”
A lot of those stories weren’t written down like the stories of famous white pioneers were, she said. So piecing together the lives of these people can be difficult at times.
Other re-enactors play various western historic figures, such as Mary Fields, the first African-American female mail carrier in the country and pioneer Barney Ford, who was born into slavery and escaped via the Underground Railroad as a teenager. He eventually became an influential political activist and businessman in Denver, even opposing Colorado statehood because becoming a state would have meant black men could not vote.
Both Brown and Ford are represented in artwork at the Colorado State Capitol.
“Americans of African descent use an oral history, a lot of our history is oral and so I would hear the stories growing up about different people, about what being enslaved was like,” Clark said. “I was amazed as a child that there were no black cowboys on TV because I knew a lot of black cowboys. That piqued my interest growing up. I began researching it and putting those pieces together.”
There are five re-enactors in the guild — some who are in their 90s, Clark said — but she’s hoping to get a new generation involved to tell the stories that have mostly been written out of history books.
“A lot of the people we do were former slaves. That little piece of her life, of Clara Brown’s life, gives people an insight into what it was like to be property,” she said, explaining that once she was telling a story about Brown being sold at an estate sale and noticed a woman crying.
“I guess I did it right,” Clark said.
Her hope is that the guild will soon be a place for young actors of color who are as interested in the stories of Latino and black historical figures who helped discover, build and make the west what it is today.
Steve Shepard, who is on the museum’s advisory committee and sometimes plays Ford, said getting young people involved is sometimes the hardest part about the work.
“One of the biggest challenges of passing this tradition on, he said, is getting younger generations to not view history through a modern-day lens. Reenactments are an invaluable way to engage people in a part of Colorado history that doesn’t always get told, because humans experience an actual person talking to them about their lives and it’s so much more receptive than being lectured to.”
The guild has traveled as far as Laramie, Wyoming, for the Higher Ground Festival, which celebrates western rural living, for reenactments. They’re also regulars at the museum and hope to be more prevalent across the state and region with more members.
“We would like this to continue with the next generation,” Clark said.
People who are interested in joining the guilt can visit www.bawmhc.org for contact information.
The museum is open Fridays and Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.