Local woman wants community’s help highlighting art, music and history at new African-American cultural center
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IDAHO FALLS – Delphia Bradley came to Idaho Falls last December to escape abuse, harassment and racism. Now she’s starting a new venture in hopes of eradicating these things in eastern Idaho.
The 39-year-old woman of African descent is in the process of opening an African-American cultural center at 751 South Capital.
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I Am — Idaho African Art Museum and Cultural Center is slated to open sometime in 2025. It will include art displays and classes on African-American culture. The idea is to make it a positive space for people to enjoy the music, dance and talents of African-Americans.
I Am is not only an acronym for the venue’s name, Bradley tells EastIdahoNews.com it’s also intended to be an affirmation statement for black people.
“We as a people of African descent have been dehumanized (in the past) and it’s time for us to give ourselves those affirmations — I am great, I am awesome, I am worthy,” Bradley says. “We can walk with our heads high.”
The nonprofit will run entirely on donations. Bradley and her board of advisors are hosting a fundraising gala for the venue on Nov. 3. The goal is to raise at least $15,000 to get it started.
Bradley explains her vision for the cultural center in a conversation with EastIdahoNews.com.
“The cultural center is going to be a way to revitalize and reconstruct the norm for youth involvement in this community,” Bradley says. “We want to use the talents and skillsets of the youth to put on a theatrical performance to convey the conversations between the races that are uncomfortable.”
The “uncomfortable conversations” she’s referring to revolve around personal experiences she’s had since moving to Idaho Falls, and throughout her life.
Though living in eastern Idaho has been a positive experience overall for Bradley and her family, she says racism is still something she encounters. Recently, her son was outside riding his bike and a white boy approached him. He was excited at the prospect of making a friend, she says, but it didn’t turn out that way.
“The first thing the boy said to my son was the ‘N’ word,” says Bradley. “He said it four times and my son was devastated. That was the first time my son had ever been called that … and that’ll stick with him for a lifetime.”
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Similarly, Mosy Moran — who is also black and owns a local concert venue that will provide sound, lighting and music at Bradley’s gala — says he’s been called the ‘N’ word about 10 times in the last year.
Moran says most people who call him that don’t know what it means, but they do know it’s a derogatory term and there’s no reason to say it. When he explains that to people, some still choose to say it anyway.
Regardless of the intent behind it, Moran says it’s still racism and these are the types of “uncomfortable conversations” that need to be addressed.
That’s exactly what Bradley aims to do with the new cultural center.
“We don’t want to keep pounding the racism conversation on the head. What we want to do is make sure it dies” by having open discussions about it and educating people about black history, she says.
Black history in eastern Idaho
America’s history with slavery and civil rights is well-documented and continues to be a topic of conversation, but what isn’t as well known is black history in eastern Idaho.
The earliest record of an African-American in the Gem State dates back to the Lewis and Clark Expedition in 1805. York, Clark’s slave, was part of the expedition and attracted attention from the native tribes, according to a documentary produced by the Pocatello chapter of the NAACP.
One of the earliest African-Americans in Idaho Falls was Ned Leggroan. He was a former slave in Mississippi who settled in Salt Lake in 1870 before moving to Idaho in 1890, the University of Utah reports.
He and his wife, Susan, joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints years earlier before establishing a homestead and sheep ranch in Milo in the early 1900s. The Leggroans sold the ranch and retired in 1911. They lived the rest of their lives in Idaho Falls.
Twenty-six years after Ned’s death, Reginald Reeves — who passed away last year at age 95 — joined a law firm in Idaho Falls after becoming the first black man to graduate from the University of Idaho College of Law.
During the height of the Civil Rights movement, Pocatello had the largest black population in the state. Idaho State University history professor Kevin Marsh says that during the 1960s and 70s, there were between 500 and 600 African-Americans living in the Gate City.
This population boom was the culmination of a nationwide movement. Between 1910 and 1970, six million blacks migrated from the southern U.S. to other parts of the country to escape racial violence, Jim Crow laws and limited job opportunities, according to the National Archives.
Pocatello attracted many people after the first and second world wars because jobs were in high demand and the railroad was hiring. Pocatello was a major stopping point for Union Pacific at the time.
Tracey and Birdie Thompson were among the first group of African-Americans who moved to Pocatello after World War I.
“Tracey worked as a laborer on the Oregon Short Line in the winter, and he rode the rodeo circuit in the summer,” Marsh writes in a book he co-authored with Thompson family members in 2005.
Tracey was a champion bronco rider who was ultimately killed in Bozeman, Montana in 1930.
Years later, Tracey’s grandson, Thomas “Les” Purce, became the first black elected official in Idaho. He was elected to the Pocatello City Council in 1973 and became mayor in 1976.
Purce is now 77 and lives in Washington, a black history website reports.
Ed Sanders was another prominent African-American citizen who came to Pocatello after World War II. He attended ISU on a boxing scholarship during the 1950s and later won an Olympic gold medal, Marsh says. He died from boxing injuries during a fight in 1954.
Racism and segregation in Pocatello
Historical records indicate that life for African-Americans was much better in eastern Idaho than in other places, though it still had its challenges.
Segregation was a reality in Pocatello. The blacks lived in a part of town referred to as the Triangle Neighborhood because it formed a triangle east of the rail yard. It was bordered by Center Street to the south and South 8th Avenue to the east.
Unwritten agreements among Pocatello realtors banned people of color from living outside of the Triangle, Marsh reports.
The Ku Klux Klan became active in Pocatello in 1920, according to the Idaho Legislature’s black history timeline, and it “used intimidation to keep ethnic minorities in the segregated neighborhood.”
“In 1923, the Triangle’s black residents were in a state of fear. The Klan had burned a cross and staged an open parade marching the streets of the downtown business district. Klansmen began regular horseback rides through the black community dressed in white sheets, carrying rifles, and firing into the air,” Marsh writes in his book. “Black men took positions on the roofs of their houses to protect their families and their churches while Klansmen rode down Pocatello Avenue and North 3rd.”
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The completion of Bethel Baptist Church in 1922 helped solidify the Triangle Neighborhood as the city’s black community. The building at 401 North 5th Avenue still exists and is the oldest black congregation in town.
Segregation wasn’t officially a law in Idaho, but many business owners enforced it, preventing blacks from frequenting shops and businesses in town, or restricting them to a certain section of the building.
More than a decade before the Civil Rights movement began in Washington, D.C. with one of the largest demonstrations in history, many of Pocatello’s citizens held a demonstration of their own.
“In 1952, the YMCA here in town didn’t allow black children to use their pool. Local people in black and white communities began marching outside the YMCA, saying we aren’t going to tolerate this,” Marsh explains. “These types of things were happening on a smaller scale throughout the West before Martin Luther King emerged as a civil rights leader in the South.”
In the late 1970s, Marsh says the Triangle Neighborhood began to dissolve as many black families moved away. Idaho was in a recession at the time and many of them went searching for better job opportunities.
There was also a nationwide urban renewal movement around this time that was racially motivated. It pushed minorities out of their homes to new areas. The area was slowly cleared out as a result.
Today, most of the neighborhood is gone, but there are remnants of those families that still live there.
Embracing change and building bridges
In 1983, the Idaho Legislature passed statute 18-7902, which prohibits malicious harassment based on racial or ethnic identity.
Despite all the progress with civil rights since then, Bradley says there’s still work to be done in improving relationships between races.
Though previous generations of African-Americans have dealt with racial discrimination, Bradley says the rising generation is ready to embrace change and she wants local youth of all races to be part of that.
“The youth are ready and their minds are still forming. We have to take charge of the rising generation right now because they will become the future politicians, doctors and decision-makers,” she says.
Bradley says the timing is right for opening an African-American cultural center in Idaho Falls. While there is a black history museum in Boise, there’s nothing like it on this side of the state.
She hopes it will help build bridges and that people will support it.
“This is going to be monumental. This is going to be a tourist attraction for Idaho Falls,” Bradley says. “When we open the doors, it has to be spot on.”
An exact opening date is yet to be determined, pending the fundraising gala, which is happening from 6 – 9 p.m. on Nov. 3. Food will be provided by Delphia Cajun Creole, Bradley’s meal delivery service. There will be a fashion show highlighting African-American attire, along with music and dancing.
An artist from Nigeria will present his art and Bradley will give a few remarks.
To donate money or art, contact Bradley via email at Iamculturalcenter@gmail.com.
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