Mayor Ruth Correll

Ruth Correl was mayor of Boulder in the first half o the decade of the ‘80s and had been outspoken on behalf of peace and anti-nuclear issues. After I interviewed Ms. Correl she flew to the Soviet Union as a delegate to the World Congress of Women, which was held in Moscow.

Ruth, in the period of the ‘60s and ‘70s, Boulder elected its first Black mayor and a woman mayor. Would that have been possible in the ‘40s or ‘50s? How much did the times have to do with it? Boulder had its first female County Clerk, Clela Rorex, who created controversy by permitting a same-sex marriage in Boulder. Was Boulder on the leading-edge of a cultural revolution? What are your views of that period from a political standpoint? And, finally, how did you get involved with politics?

Well, actually I wasn’t here during the ‘40s or ‘50s, but where I was, which was in the middle of Indiana, it would still not be possible to have a Black or a woman mayor in that particular little town in the middle of Indiana. But in Boulder – I don’t know. I suppose the thing that changed the political climate most drastically was not only the things that happened during the ‘60s in terms of changes in the makeup of the demographics, the Boulder population, but also the fact in the election of ’71 the students had the vote for the first time as 18 year olds.

An 18 year old could vote and it was thought that this would continue to be a very exciting thing for 18 year olds. It hasn’t been. The 18 or 19 year old students have not participated in any vote as they did that vote in that year. I think they participate more in presidential elections, but as far as city council elections are concerned, ’71 was their election year.

They didn’t vote as a bloc. They didn’t vote necessarily as ‘60s liberals. But they did vote. And I did make a big difference, not only in the numbers, but in the way the election went. So the election of ’71, which brought in a Black councilperson for the first time; brought in Karen Paget at age 26; brought in Tim Fuller, who was certainly a flower child, and had lots and lots of ideas that were right out of the ‘60s. It brought in Ken Wright, who was a very strong environmentalist. And then there was John Buechner, who had been the mayor and was reelected.

The turnover was greater than it has been since, in any council election. I think most people who were watching what was happening would say that it was the student vote. There were the 18 year olds, and of course the 19 and 20 year olds, that had been expecting all of their lives that they couldn’t vote until they were 21.

You mentioned a lot of names. For those people who don’t know who these people were, what sort of City Council was it?

It was a real reversal from the City Council that had gone into the election. The council that had gone into the election was an all-male council. I wouldn’t exactly call it a conservative council, because you had John Buechner and Jim Bowers, who was a planner. You (also) had Tom Waugh. Remember, he and his brother were the management of Arapahoe Chemicals, back in the days before Arapahoe became Syntex. Chuck Haertling was on it, but Chuck didn’t run in ’71. His term didn’t end, so he didn’t have to run. I think Dick Geesman was on it, but he didn’t have to run.

In general, you would call them a middle of the road Council. It may be that Howard Klemme was on it, but he didn’t have to run. But, in mentioning the names, what I think is important to note is that it was an all-male council. It was basically a very thoughtful and concerned council, but they were not people who were advocates, unless some of them were advocates for the business position, which I think that they probably were. There was a turnover between that council and the council that came in January of 1972.

Pen Tate was the first Black councilperson ever to be elected. He had been a member of the Human Relations Commission, as I was, and had been very active in civil rights issues and, of course, the rights of minorities, particularly the Black people who are a real minority in Boulder – less than one percent at that time and probably still are.

But Pen was a lawyer and had been on the Human Relations Commission in Fort Collins, interestingly enough, and worked with that group, even though he lived in Boulder. He worked for that group as a professional. He was on the Human Relations Commission for the city as a volunteer. He worked hard for the rights of minorities and was very active in getting the commission into some of the things that we did.

Karen Paget was 26 years old, completing her Ph.D. in political science, and an advocate for women’s issues. Her career developed very rapidly. She was on the Council until 1974. The first time she won a two year term, the second time a four year term. But she ran on a lot of things besides women’s issues.

She was very active in finding out what would make the Council more efficient (and) more effective in areas that a political scientist would see in terms of what was in the charter or in the code, but needed to be changed.

It was in vogue during that era to have a Black homecoming queen or a Black mayor in places like Boulder or Berkeley. Liberal cities kind of set that trend. Would Penfield Tate have been elected had he been White?

I think he might well have been because Pen is a very outgoing, warm, interested, intelligent person. The law degree helped him, but he might not have been elected with quite the majority. I ran Pen’s campaign in ’71. It was a very exciting thing to see the amount of support that he drew . . . The amount of interest. And I think it (must be) emphasized that it was greater than it would have been had he been White.

Partly, people’s ideas about the need for representation for minorities did change in the ‘60s. Certainly they did in Boulder. I think it did across the whole country because, of course, over the past two decades the number of Black mayors has increased. You can just tick them off: There’s Tom Bradley in Los Angeles; Harold Washington in Chicago; The mayor of Washington, D.C.; Several mayors in New Jersey. It’s more than just tokenism.

But in Boulder, well, I think Pen was the first Black mayor in the state. He was mayor from ’73 until ’75. In Boulder he did top the ticket in ’71, and anyone who tops the ticket in one year has a great chance if the Council decides to, at least try for the mayoralty. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. It’s up to City Council to make that decision. Pen wanted to be mayor and was chosen in 1973.

Was he recalled?

He went through the recall. He won the recall.

Would you like to talk about the recall?

Sure. I was the last surviving member who voted for the sexual orientation issue. As I said, Pen was mayor from 1973 to ’75, and at some point in his very first year, he brought up the issue of sexual orientation. He wanted to add it to a list of things which we could not allow discrimination.

Sexual orientation was an almost totally new concept in people’s thinking – and it was a very interesting evolution. That, in itself, would (provide enough material) for an entire book.

Pen brought it up, and the rule is that if three people are interested, you’ll explore it a little bit, and it was explored a little bit. An ordinance was brought forward just at the end of December. That was in ’73, and the second reading of the ordinance was on January 1, 1974.

January 1 was a changeover, there having been an election in November, 1972. But the old City Council had to do the second reading on this ordinance. It was read and it passed with five votes, and following that January 1 session, the new City Council was installed. Bob Trenka and Frank Buchanan came in as new members of the Council and three people were reelected, Karen Paget among them.

The reporter from the Daily Camera, at the end of the meeting said to Roger Cracroft, who was then the reporter from KBOL: “Well, nothing much happened at this meeting.” And Roger said: “Are you kidding? Something that’s going to tear this town apart just happened. “ The reporter from the Camera just didn’t realize what adding sexual orientation to the list of things that were prohibited in the ordinance under consideration by the Human Relations Commission – discrimination based upon sex, race, religion, country of origin, and so on (would do).

There were five areas listed then, and sexual orientation was to be added. That started the great cry for what eventually turned out to be the recall. It went from January of ’74 until September. The process we went through was extremely painstaking and painful.

Pen was the mayor and he, of course, had some authority in the direction of the process. Basically, once the City Council had done what it had done in order to go forward with the implementation of this issue, the recall was started. The two to whom the recall was directed were Pen and Tim Fuller.

Tim, as I said, was a flower child – and flower children were regarded quite differently because they weren’t thought of as transients or people who might be violent or disruptive. They were just there and the people on The Hill and downtown found themselves bothered because people were on the streets sitting in front of buildings and they were urinating and defecating in the alleys and at night in obvious places, and they were sleeping in public places. But they were not regarded as a disruption in the way they would be a little bit later at the time of the violence and the riot on The Hill.

So Tim, as the owner of the bookstore on The Hill, was elected with a good constituency and had a lot of great ideas on the environment, civil rights, and different things that would help the transportation situation (and) on tenants’ rights. He was very strong on that.

He had spent a lot of time putting together an ordinance on rent stabilization. It didn’t get anywhere, but he worked hard on social and human interest issues. He was lots of fun and really different. He was the first of . . . I guess you’d say of the syndrome where city councilmen appeared in jeans and boots, instead of three-piece suits and ties. One of the things that we did as (members of) the Human Relations Commission in response to the flower children was to initiate what we called The Boulder Program. We had fifty, maybe sixty volunteers who took turns and had regular schedules. We sometimes had as many as eight or ten people on the street at once just trying to be ombudsmen to calm down the activities of the hippies. At the same time, we helped the merchants to put up with it.

I don’t know whether it did any good or not, but we ran a communications center in the building where Alfalfa’s is now. That communications center was supported by the city. This center was a place where the kids could go for information about places where they might be able to sleep legally or for information about other city services available to them. I don’t think we ever served anything there but coffee.

If they (were on) drugs or were drunk, they were not allowed in the center. It wasn’t a place where they could stay. It was just an information service. That was the work of the Human Relations Commission, and the city did support it with money.

Out of all this evolved the sexual orientation ordinance and the recall attempt. Tim Fuller was recalled, even though in the election he did get more votes than the person who replaced him, who was George Boland. Tim was quite young and extremely creative, thoughtful and intelligent. He was responsive to his constituents and to the people with warmth, caring, and love. Pen was not recalled – but he was defeated in the following election in ’75.

How has Boulder changed politically since then?

The major issue is still growth. That started in ’71. In 1971 there were two issues on the ballot. One of them was Zero Population Growth (ZPG). That was placed on by petition. And the Council, with the city Manager’s direction, placed on the ballot the second growth issue, which was to direct the Council to limit the growth of people to a lesser rate of growth that we had in the ‘60s, because the city had doubled (in population) during the ‘60s, from 28,000 to 60,000 people. The result was that the people were persuaded to support the second issue. The Danish Plan, and the things that went before it, the Blue Line, the greenbelts and land use were the issues that are still the issues.

Copyright 2026 S. Byron Gassaway