LaVozColorado celebrates 50 incredible years!
Ernest Gurulé
LaVozColorado has served as the state’s and region’s preeminent bilingual weekly publication focusing on issues often missed or even ignored by legacy media
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La Voz Colorado
Because so much of the population and, particularly Colorado’s, is under the age of fifty, many of the stories that have appeared in the pages of LaVozColorado might seem either foreign or more likely ‘ancient history.’ Nonetheless, over that span, like clockwork, each week, LaVozColorado has offered readers stories that are now part of our collective history. Or, perhaps, others right now, are being talked about at water coolers, diners or kitchen tables.

As important, is the fact that LaVozColorado has served as the state’s and region’s preeminent bilingual weekly publication focusing on issues often missed or even ignored by legacy media, but nevertheless remain important to our growing Latino population as well as so many others.

Over the course of the last half century, LaVozColorado has educated its readers on state and local politics, introduced readers to individuals or ideas they might not learn about from other agencies. It has provided news about sports, weather and climate while regularly providing information important to their lives.

When LaVozColorado launched in 1974 there were far, far fewer social, political or Latino or Latina leaders and influencers as well as sources where we could learn about them. But we, like you, have watched this picture, this landscape, change in an amazingly important way.

There is neither enough time nor space to encapsulate all the important people, places and events that have captured our headlines over the last half century. Instead, what we hope to do is simply convey the arc of the news and information LaVozColorado has brought to both its readers and visitors, in the age of the internet where news travels instantaneously, the entire world.

America learned about Denver native Rodolfo ‘Corky’ Gonzales during the turbulent 1960s and 1970s. The Crusade for Justice, Corky Gonzales and his wife Geraldine led the fight for civil rights and equality. The newest public library at the busy intersection of Colfax and Irving bears his name. Dolores Huerta, the ‘right arm’ and farm labor leader Cesar Chavez have appeared on these pages. LaVozColorado readers have read the amazing stories of José Hernandez and Ellen Ochoa. Hernandez grew up in a migrant labor family. Hernandez spent 13 days in space aboard the space shuttle. His story is told in the movie, ‘Million Miles Away.’ Ochoa was America’s first Latina astronaut. Ochoa is also a classical flutist who has performed with the Stanford Symphony Orchestra. She played the flute on her first space mission.

The roll call for amazing stories about amazing Latinos has been and will always be part of the mission of LaVozColorado. Space limitations prevent a comprehensive list. But when a Latino makes a significant contribution to the arts, science and technology or even pop culture, you will read about them here.

LaVozColorado has written about the state’s good, bad and ugly. And politically, nothing may have been uglier than the 1992 passage of Amendment 2. It essentially robbed the LGBQT community of many of its civil rights. The U.S. Supreme Court later ruled it unconstitutional. LaVozColorado has also covered a number of governors, to name a few, Richard Lamm. Roy Romer, Bill Owens, John Hickenlooper including the election of the state’s first openly gay state Chief Executive, Governor Jared Polis.

LaVozColorado has featured stories about a young south Texas lawyer who planted roots in Denver, became a leader in the state legislature and made history in 1983 when he upset the establishment, becoming Denver’s first Latino Mayor. Federico Peña would go on to serve as President Bill Clinton’s Secretary of Transportation and later Secretary of Energy. For newcomers, think ‘Peña Boulevard.’

We covered the candidacy and ascendence of Ken Salazar, ‘el hijo de Valle,’ who was born and raised in the San Luis Valley, became the state’s first Latino to win a statewide political race and become Colorado Attorney General. Salazar went on to the U.S. Senate, became Secretary of the Interior, and, today, serves as U.S. Ambassador to Mexico.

When LaVozColorado began publishing, Denver was a ‘fly-over,’ city. No longer. Today, Denver International Airport, a single element in Mayor Peña’s ‘Imagine a Great City,’ vision is now the world’s third busiest airport. DIA connects Denver to the world with non-stop flights departing and arriving daily. The airport project was begun by Peña and completed by Mayor Wellington Webb, Denver’s first African American mayor. DIA’s first flight landed February 28, 1995. More than a billion passengers have since passed through its gates. Recently LaVozColorado reported on a young Latino attorney and Harvard graduate, Everett Martinez hired as lead counsel for DEN.

Today LaVozColorado goes to the world via the internet, an idea thought inconceivable in 1974. We now live in a city and region crisscrossed by a light rail system; a city whose sports appetite is satisfied by major sports franchises (the Denver Broncos, the Denver Nuggets, the Colorado Avalanche, the Colorado Rockies, and the Colorado Rapids), including several with world champion- ships (still waiting on the Rockies). The city has, indeed, blossomed.

But while Denver and LaVozColorado have grown together over the past 50 years, one event has stood out above all others, and it was covered early on in these pages. It concerned an emerging virus that was appearing first in China and soon finding landing spots in other Pacific Rim nations.

On February 5, 2020, LaVozColorado featured a front-page story on this emerging virus. At the time, thousands—mostly in Asia—had contracted it but only a few hundred had died. Few, at the time—even those who studied viruses—could imagine how COVID19 as it was named, would impact the world. “Most people will get better, some people won’t,” said Denver Health and Hospital’s Dr. Gaby Frank as we entered one of the darkest periods of the last hundred years.

Worldwide, COVID killed more than 15 million people. Across the U.S. it claimed more than a million lives. In Colorado more than 1.7 million people contracted COVID, more than 14,500 died from the virus. It remains an active virus, but its impact has fallen dramatically.

Over its lifetime, LaVozColorado has reported on Colorado’s worst natural disaster ever, a day before Colorado’s Centennial celebration, The Big Thompson Flood took the lives of 144 men, women and children.Beyond human life, damages were estimated at $35 million, nearly $200 million in today’s dollars.

Other tragedies have also regrettably been written about on the pages of LaVozColorado. ‘Columbine,’ a single word that is referenced in all U.S. school shootings occurred April 20, 1999. Two deranged high school students marched methodically through Littleton’s Columbine High School killing twelve students and a single teacher. They would also take their own lives.

Regrettably, Columbine was not the only school mass shooting that captured the country’s and world’s attention., a number of which also occurred in Denver area schools. While the nation is not inured of this horrid crime, it nonetheless is no longer surprised when one occurs.

Twelve years ago, on July 20th, a mentally ill gunman, shot and killed a dozen people in an Aurora movie theater. Another 70 others were wounded, including 58 by gunfire. The killer, judged insane, is serving a multitude of life sentences. Suffice to say, mass shootings have become regular parts of Colorado and American life. LaVozColorado reported the senseless tragedy and regularly pays tribute to the victims.

As Denver and the region grew—it now counts more than 3 million people—so too have its options, cultural and entertainment.

One of the most significant events to occur in Denver in the 21st Century took place in 2008 when the city hosted the Democratic National Convention in which Barack Obama was nominated and later accepted the nomination at Mile High Stadium. Obama was elected as America’s first African American President. (In 2012, LaVozColorado was also the only Hispanic media to have an exclusive one-on-one interview with President Obama as he sought reelection.) LaVozColorado also endorsed its first presidential candidate in Obama.

Denver has played host to Major League Baseball’s All- Star game—not once, but twice. It also hosted the NCAA’s Final Four in 1990. Of course, LaVozColorado wrote about Denver hosting the 1975 ABA basketball game. The format had the Denver Nuggets against a team made up of the rest of the league’s all-stars. The Nuggets had three Hall of Famers on that team, David Thompson, Bobby Jones and Dan Issel. There were also Hall of Famers on the other team including Julius Erving, George Gervin and Artis Gilmore. The game featured the first Slam Dunk contest, won by Erving with an iconic last dunk. Incidentally, the Nuggets won the game.

The game was played at McNichols Arena, named for late Denver Mayor Bill McNichols. It no longer exists. The same holds true for the venue where the Colorado Rockies began play in Denver. McNichols and the original Mile High Stadium have been replaced by Ball Arena and Coors Field. Mile High Stadium is now Empower Field at Mile High.

Over the course of the last fifty years, LaVozColorado has written about the departure of Latinos who have had significant and profound impact on the city and state. Former Colorado Speaker of the House, Ruben Valdez, died in 2019. An interesting fact about Valdez is that he was Colorado’s first Latino Governor. He served for a matter of days in 1976 when both the Governor and Lieutenant Governor were out of state.

Also gone are the Honorable Roger Cisneros and his wife Adelia. The pair died together in 2017 from carbon dioxide poisoning. After serving in the Army during WWII, Cisneros returned to Denver where he earned a law degree. When he joined the bar in 1957, he was only one of five Hispanic attorneys in the state. Cisneros and his wife were both long and strong advocates for Latino civil rights. Cisneros also served in the state legislature and was appointed by late Governor Richard Lamm as district judge.

Other Latino political and social leaders no longer with us include Sal Carpio, Sam Sandos, Paul Sandoval and Val Vigil. Carpio was Denver’s first Latino City Council member. Sandos later served with Carpio.

Today, the names of Latinos and Latinas are common among Denver and Colorado’s political, educational and social power brokers. And many have been written about on these pages. While there are too many to list, here are the names of few: Polly Baca, State Senator, Ramona Martinez, City Council, Christine Arguello, the state’s first Latina federal judge, Monica Marquez, the state’s first Latina and LGBQT to sit on the state Supreme Court, Katherine Archuleta, Director of OPM in the Obama Administration Christine Marquez-Hudson, Vice President of Advancement at Metropolitan State University-Denver, Terry Fox, a Colorado Court of Appeals Judge who grew up ‘following the crops’ as the daughter of a farm worker, Susana Cordova, the state’s first Latina Education Commissioner, Patricia Barela Rivera, former SBA Director, Crisanta Duran, the first Latina Speaker of the House in the state legislature, Don Mares, CEO of the Colorado Trust Foundation, James Mejia, Chief Strategy Officer at MSU-Denver.

The list of Latinos and Latinas making contributions to Denver and Colorado in politics, the arts, science and technology and in fields where just scant years before were missing, will continue to grow and, as those who came before them, they will be written about on the pages of LaVozColorado.

This year LaVozColorado’s 50 years of weekly editions will have a permanent home at the Colorado Historic Newspapers site and will be accessible to the public, thanks to a generous donation from the Colorado Trust Foundation via the Denver Public Library Friends Foundation. Also, later this year LaVozColorado (Publisher Pauline Rivera) will be inducted into the Denver Press Club Hall of Fame.