August 14, 2026: History Colorado marks the state's 150th with a nod to the Women's Bank of Denver

You Not that long ago, women seeking a loan or line of credit faced cringeworthy questions from bankers. Are you planning on having children? What type of birth control are you using? Where's your husband? Are you planning on sending your children to college? And this is not a financial advisor. This is a very invasive, inappropriate questions. Against that backdrop in the 1970s, the Women's Bank of Denver was founded, changing financial lives for generations. She felt it was very important for all of her grandkids to have savings accounts that were in their name, that you could go deposit money from your job at. And she was proud that all of her granddaughters could do that. This story is part of a sesquicentennial show at History, Colorado, and it's the subject of our show.

This is Colorado Matters from CPR News and KRCC. I'm Ryan Warner. Not long ago, banks turned women away who wanted an account in their own name or a credit line or a loan. The Boys Club scoffed at the idea, and when they deigned to consider it, the questions they asked of female clients were invasive. This sort of treatment led a trailblazing group of women in Colorado to open a women's bank in the 1970s. Their story is now showcased at History Colorado to celebrate the sesquicentennial. It's also the subject of our show today with our reading series Turn the Page. You will know it is time to turn the page when you hear the chimes ring like this. Financial journalist Grace L. Williams is the author of Give Her Credit, the untold account of a women's bank that empowered a generation. We spoke in front of an audience of our fellow readers last year at History Colorado Center. Before laws changed, what sorts of questions could a banker ask a woman? And what sorts of things were women told when they were turned away? So women were not told very much. Unfortunately, they were not empowered to ask why they were refused services. Simply this was stated and they would, you know, have to walk off and that was it. Questions. Oh gosh. I mean, in my research. Questions that were so invasive. Are you planning on having children? What type of birth control are you using? Where's your husband? Are you planning on sending your children to college? And remember, this is not a financial advisor like we have today who will say, okay, what's the plan, right? So we want to send junior to college. We want to take our vacations. This is a very invasive, inappropriate set of questions directed at the woman. Yeah, the assumption behind many of these questions, Grace, is one, a woman should be married. Two, she should have kids. And, you know, while this might be obvious, I think it's important to run through who that leaves out. Absolutely. It leaves out people that maybe can't have children, maybe won't have children, people who want to have a career and maybe raise a family. Also, it leaves out most of what my generation has been able to do because we had these trailblazers who fought for what we have. When I hear you say that women walking into a bank could be asked about what type of birth control they're on. I mean, that's astounding to me. Were there a lot of those...

moments of surprise and shock for you in researching this? Completely. Ever since I heard about this story, I couldn't believe when I dug in with the research. Just what also was in papers, like the Women's Bank, for instance, was announced in the society pages of certain newspapers. This is a business. A legitimate business. And it's in the society pages next to this person marries this person and what's your favorite casserole recipe for the season. I was shocked how it just wasn't taken seriously. This makes me think, in the book, you use the term, I think, infantilizing. Yes. There's an infantilizing quality to how women were treated, to how their aspirations were treated, to how they reviewed by these institutions. Yeah, like paper dolls, basically. Uh-huh. You know, where you just have the design of the person and you just put her in a pretty dress and she goes in her. adventures instead of a woman who maybe has aspirations or wants something different or has feelings right has a brain has thoughts they're treated like paper dolls Denver was not the side of the first women's bank one in New York came a bit earlier and you write in fact that as far back as 1919 there was a prominent example in Clarksville Tennessee Why did you center the book on Denver then? Because the bank here was sort of a wild card in a lot of ways. When you think of a financial hub in the United States, you don't always think of Denver. It's unfair because this is definitely a financial hub. There's a lot of money and a lot of wealth here. And to sort of undercut... what's going on here. I thought, oh, this is delicious. We're thinking New York. We're thinking San Francisco. We're not thinking of Denver. And especially on the East Coast where I'm coming from, people, when I would tell them this, they were like, really? And I said, not only that, this was a very successful bank. They kicked, can I, can I, they kicked ass. They really did. Can we say ass on public radio? You just did! Like three times! Stop saying it, Grace. But they did. Well, and you say that Denver's Women's Bank was successful, and we should say that that's in contrast to the New York Bank, which did not have the longevity of the Denver institution. That's correct. Compare and contrast a little for me. One of the things that makes it stand out to me, the first being that the leadership really had...

They were on the same page about where this was going to go and what they wanted to do. And that included being extremely frugal. They were not spending a lot of money on marketing, on furniture, on things that really can zap a budget quickly. There was not infighting amongst them, which did happen in New York. And they just had incredible leadership. Everybody knew what they wanted to do. They understood the assignment, and they were there to get it done. There are two women I'd like to focus on, for starters, a silver smith and a coin wrapper. First, the silver smith. Who is Mary Eccles, and how does she fit into this story? Mary Eccles was a client of the women's bank. She approached several other banks, including her own, to attempt to get a business loan to buy Gusterman silversmiths. This was in Larimer Square. Yeah. And probably familiar to longtime Denverans. Yeah, absolutely. She was told to go home and have children. She was told she didn't know what she was talking about. just outright refused and not taken seriously, but she was very serious about running this business. She approached Women's Bank, and they at first were not able to help her secure the loan, but they gave her alternatives that then enabled her to secure the loan. So she was a client. And this gets it something. The bank is not a charity. No. They don't say yes to every woman who walks in the door. That is correct. And that's important in keeping a bank solvent. Right. Is that you have to be discerning. Yeah. And yet you have to be inclusive. I mean, that's a tough balance to strike, isn't it? I think in terms of credit, yes. If you wanted to simply open an account, that was where anyone could come in and open an account. in terms of nailing down credit, that could be a little bit tougher, like that business loan. And to this coin wrapper, or at least that's how she starts, Leray Arulyan was so deft, you write, she memorized the sensation and heft of exactly 50 cool, shiny pennies in her palm. And I love that detail. Leray would go on to become president of the Women's Bank in Denver, but speak briefly to her trajectory from Messenger and Coin Rapper. to executive. Right. She got her start in Salt Lake City, Utah. She's Mormon and was trying to figure out how to pay for college.

At around the same time, she was also getting engaged to someone who went on a mission for two years. She had a couple of choices. I think one was to sell space in the phone book or to become a messenger at the bank. She chose to be a messenger. And she just happened to be really good at her job. Immediately, the top brass recognized, oh, she's got talent. She's good. So she was promoted to coin wrapper. I think she started helping to write loans. I mean, she was really getting in there quickly. and also at the same time thinking gosh maybe i don't want to get married now maybe i want a career which is unreal and unheard of if it's nineteen fifty four and you're in salt lake city preparing pretty traditional culture preparing for this yeah so ultimately she broke off her engagement made plans to go to new york wanted to work on wall street and denver was a stop on her drive across the country and she ended up staying got some jobs in other banks and continued to get promoted. But like a lot of women I think can relate, she ended up hitting what's called, I guess, the glass ceiling or the pink ceiling and never really got what she wanted to get at the bank she worked out before Women's Bank. And so we should talk about the women's bank not just as an opportunity for its clients, but frankly, as an opportunity to those women who wished to work in finance, in banking, who kept hitting ceilings elsewhere. But it's a little bit of a chicken and egg proposition, right? I mean, you're opening a bank in an industry that's been male-dominated. Where do you find women executives? And you write about that in some detail. How did the original group of co-founders even begin, you know... I'll just remind people this is before Google. Yes, it's way before. It's way before. A little minute before Google. How do you begin to find... executives if you want the leadership of the bank to reflect the clientele. So one of the things that I learned is that PTAs were a huge, huge breeding ground for women leaders. Parent-teacher associations. Yes, PTAs. Also, if you were a member perhaps of a social club, or Chamber of Commerce if you had a business. And so it was sort of friends of friends telling each other, this is going on, you've got to get involved and come and do this. They would also do clip searches. I mean, so if they picked up a magazine or a newspaper and they happened to read a headline about a woman in banking, they would pretty quickly write that person a letter and start networking even outside of Colorado. Yes.

I mean, the circle's not huge at this point. Right. As you point out in this book, Colorado and Wyoming were trailblazers in giving women the right to vote. But, you know, suffrage was a pretty exclusive movement racially. White women led the charge, often muffling voices of color. And Grace, as I opened your book, I just braced for a story about wealthy white women founding a bank. There are women of color that get in on the ground floor. Was that a surprise to you? I will say that I was surprised at how intersectional and diverse it was because I didn't have a lot of knowledge about who lives in Colorado, to be quite honest. When I did more of my research, I understood you have a lot of rich cultures that are not white. There's a lot going on out here. Again, the East Coaster who doesn't know. Oh, you think this is flyover country, or you thought that. Well, I... Let me just... You grew up in Michigan. I'm from flyover country, yes. Okay, yeah. Okay. Wait, wait. Yeah, yeah. I'm from flyover country. But, you know, the stereotype of the Cowtown person, if you will, that I think a lot of people have stamped in their mind is not going to be an African-American woman who advocates through the NAACP. But she's here. She's absolutely here. Is that a mission then of the Women's Bank to make sure that the clientele matches the diversity of the... community. I mean, this is actually a source of some tension in the early deliberations. How mission driven should the bank be versus how much should it pay attention to the balance sheets solely, you know? So it goes back to your point that the people who kind of understood what needed to happen knew you can't just give away money, right? You're going to have to have people who are clients that you're able to serve, and those are people who maybe put money into the bank and have enough that they could come and get a loan for their house or their business. But again, I think it's super important to underscore that they were mindful. that not everybody could be a major client and still sort of made those inroads like with mary echoes so that they were able to eventually figure out how to do it but yeah they needed to make money obviously you got to keep the lights on Financial journalist Grace L. Williams is with us, author of Give Her Credit, the untold account of a women's bank that empowered a generation. We read it for Turn the Page with Colorado Matters. Our show, recorded last year at History Colorado Center, returns in a moment as a lawmaker who fought against faulty pantyhose turns her attention to discrimination in banking. This is Colorado Matters from CPR News.

It's Colorado Matters from CPR News. I'm Ryan Warner. In the 1970s, banks were boys' clubs. So an innovative group of women created the Women's Bank of Denver. Let's get back to their story as told in the book, Give Her Credit. Author Grace L. Williams joined me on stage at History Colorado Center for our series, Turn the Page. Before we get into the obstacles and frankly the drama of opening a bank, let's talk about the legal backdrop. So how do laws change in the 70s to empower women who wanted financial independence? So this is going to be, it's 1974, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act passes, and this is supposed to level the playing field so that women have the same access to credit and services as men. Major distinction, I think it sort of implied that it would be more middle class white women, but it was supposed to even the playing field for women in general. But you know, laws change and then it takes a little bit for societies too. Yeah. Do you want to talk about the Brown Palace? Talk about the meeting in the Brown Palace. So this actually occurred, I'm blanking on the year, but I think it's around the time that sort of anti-discrimination laws are coming into play, and you can't just tell people you can't be here. But there was a dining space at the Brown Palace that wouldn't let women come in at lunchtime. They felt women would distract the men who were trying to conduct business. And Wendy Davis, who, well, she's in our audience tonight. She and a few of her colleagues went and raised a little heck there and got some things to move. Yeah. Yeah. This was a meeting of the founders of the Women's Bank, right? This was her and some colleagues at her workplace, actually. So she was the lone actor from the Women's Bank Group. Aha. Yeah. That rabble roused. The lone agitator, yes. And the Brown Palace, not wanting to get bad press, changed their tune pretty quickly. Yeah. I feel strange bringing this up, but this item is mentioned several times in your book. Pantyhose. Let's start with a lawmaker who's critical in this story, whose first fight has to do with panty hose. That's Lenore Dan Sullivan of Missouri.

She introduced the Equal Credit Opportunity Act. She was definitely the groundbreaker and very instrumental in bringing it to the floor and making it pass. And I thought, okay, what else has she done? And I discovered, you know, food stamps. She's like a godmother of food stamps. She wanted cosmetics to be labeled for safety. And the panty hose thing. She went and said, we need panty hose that actually are strong enough to get us through the day. And as a person who doesn't wear them, because no one required me to wear them, I thought, okay, I want to get more perspective on this. And I have a few sisters-in-law who are just a bit older. And they said, oh my gosh, we had drawers and drawers and drawers of the egg. And they had runs in them. And you had to run out at lunchtime and get some more. or use nail polish to, like, get the run. And you could be sent home if your employer was dissatisfied with the quality of your panty hose, which were not designed to really hold up. No, they were designed to keep the market going. Yes, yes. Planned obsolescence, yes. And so this becomes a consumer protection issue that she pursues before the Credit Act. Yeah, I think, yeah. Yeah, a little bit before, yeah. We'll get back to Pantyhost because they come back into the story. In speaking with friends about this book, I got a lot of women in my life who have told me stories of financial discrimination that they continue to experience. So I'll just share one. Grace is going to share an example as well, but this was relayed to me by a friend who is married, yes, bought a car. In her own name, husband wasn't there. With her own money, from her own account, there was absolutely no mister involved in this transaction. You know, drives away with a new car and several weeks later gets a thank you note to Mr. So-and-So. Okay, that seems to have resonated for someone. You had a story that's pretty similar. With cars. I feel like there's just something about women in cars and just crazy sexist practice. So I have a very long-standing relationship with an auto mechanic who works on my car, services my car. My husband got a new car that he serviced through a dealership, and one day I said, why don't you bring it to our guy? He's good. Who do you think got the holiday card from the mechanic? After years of my loyal service. Not the longtime client. Was not the wife. It was with it that way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, the card's always addressed to him. It's ridiculous. I'll ask you more about ways you think the story resonates. But among the founders who often met in living rooms, there is a fundamental tension over precisely whom the bank should serve, as we've discussed. And where it should be located, citing a bank, it turns out, is actually quite a science, quite market research intensive. And there's the question of whether the bank should have the word women's in its name.

I think most of the founding women wanted the name women's. It absolutely needed to have it. I think there were some skeptical sort of side characters or sidebar people, men, some men. One even saying that this could derail the whole operation if you put the name women's in it, which the question then is why are you at the meeting, right? We're meeting about a women's bank. What are you doing here? But I think they were adamant that they wanted the name women in there. And that was one sticking point they were not going to back down from. You mentioned men. And there are male characters in the book who are of some assistance in the founding of the bank. And I suppose as a writer, you have a question. of how prominently to feature them and whose story this is. So I have always felt, I mean, I'm a financial journalist, and a lot of what I've written is more through the male gaze because men taught me how to write about finance, right? Huh. This story, I really wanted it to be through the female gaze. I wanted to strip away a lot of what I had been taught. and a lot of what I had read in the past and really write this from the perspective of what it is to be a woman doing something like this. And you've been at Wall Street Journal, Dow Jay Jones. Barrens? Yes. What does it mean to have stripped away what you learned from male editors? Can you say more about that? Sure, so we take away some of the things that really make a narrative delicious to read or yummy. I've been called chatty as a writer. I consider that a compliment. So I make it chatty. Oh, that's interesting. Like, voice is discouraged. Yeah. Well, you can have it, but only to a certain extent, you know. You can't be chatty, which, I mean, if you ask someone to define that, what does that mean? Exactly. Exactly. Uh-huh. So, as you wrote the book, did you find yourself, I'll use your term, did you find yourself pushing to be more chatty to get back into that natural you? Is that a write and rewrite exercise? It was definitely rewrite exercising, yeah. And I wanted to make sure that we paid homage to the men that were supportive, but this was a woman's story. We really wanted to tell it from the perspective of these women. And their mothers, their entrepreneurs, their wives, their socialites, their activists, and sort of looking through it and relating to each woman, myself personally, through one thing, helped sort of shape what then you've read.

Give her credit is the story of a women's bank in Denver that empowered a generation. We read it together last year for Turn the Page, and we're re-sharing the conversation to mark the state's sesquicentennial. At History of Colorado Center right now, you can see the bank's opening day financial ledger and other items. More with financial journalist Grace L. Williams when we return location, location, location. First. I love a foreign language cover. Here's 9 to 5 from the late Brazilian artist Lillian. You're with CPR News and KRCC. Mrs. Turn the Page with Colorado Matters from CPR News and KRCC. I'm Ryan Warner. When you think of financial capitals, Denver may not spring to mind. And yet in the 1970s, the trailblazing Women's Bank here helped bring financial independence to women from all walks of life. As the state marks its sesquicentennial, let's return to History Colorado Center, where author Grace L. Williams, join me on stage to discuss her book, give her credit. To this idea of where you locate a bank, why this is so important to, I suppose, anyone under 40 is that you used to go into banks. Yes.

The ATM is like only getting started at this point. It's very, very high tech and expensive. And expensive, yeah. Expound on the importance of siting, of locating a bank. And frankly, the study and indeed the market analysis that goes into this question, where in Denver, what neighborhood, close to whom and to what? So they went and did a bunch of outreach through the greater Denver area just by picking up the phone and calling numbers in the phone book. And the question was, if there was a bank in downtown Denver, would you come and do your banking there? Like a yes or a no. If it had the name women's in it, would you want to be a client? Yes or no. And found out that there was indeed some interest, right? But in terms of where to locate, they really had to prove, okay, there's a need for this location to be here. And it had to be one location, right? Because we also didn't have branch banking here. So it had to be people who were willing to come and do their business in downtown Denver at a women's bank. So a niche within a niche within a niche, but people were interested. And branch banking, that's a legal question. Like it wasn't allowed at this point, correct? It wasn't here, yeah. So they decide on downtown, a rather storied building. Yes. Anyone who has walked into it has probably had their breath taken away, the equitable building. Yes. Wow, I mean, it has such history. The design of the building, the double E structure, which is just, I, you know, I'm not an architect major, and so studying about it, I just couldn't believe it. The Tiffany glass, the stone that went into it, just all of the care, the marble, it was a very stunning place to open up. and it was also sending a message equitable as the name where this is their home, but also we can be here. We can be in a stately space. Yes. It doesn't have to feel fly by night. We can be in this regal building doing our thing. Exactly. Okay, to the panty house again. The bank is designed. in very thoughtful ways, the notion of, well, I'll let you describe it. What goes into some of the details of the design? So I think you're talking actually about the New York City Bank. Oh, okay. Where one of the things that they put in the design was rounded tabletops so the panty hose wouldn't snag. So clearly a woman thought of this, right? The Denver Bank, I know, they design to be less, what's the word? Intimidating. Yeah, exactly. So if you look at images of the suite that they had before they became tenants, at some point in history, it was a bank, I think, a couple times. And if you look at the images of it, at the teller window, it's like jail bars almost, right?

and then just a little round area to sort of pass things through back and forth. When they set up Women's Bank, it was countertops. They took away the barrier between teller and client or manager and client. Everybody was kind of on the same playing field and we're just talking like you and I. Yeah. Instead of I'm behind the jail bars, which could be considered perceived, I think, as cold and sort of a rank and file. There's a question among the founders, whether it should be a state or a federally chartered bank. And, you know, that conversation sounds like it would be watching paint dry, but it's fascinating. Because this is a big dilemma. It's a fork in the road. Why is this such a big choice for the founders of the Women's Bank? It's an extra step that's going to take longer and could leave you to more susceptibility to be denied the permission to organize. And if you get the distinction, you get to put NA after it. And a couple of the women who are founding members will email and they always put NA after. This is like a kudo, essentially. They wound up getting a federal charter. They did the national charter, yeah. So DC recognizes you as a nationally chartered bank. It's a big deal. And it has everything to do as well with what the original members of the bank, founders of the bank. must contribute and how much of the bank they can own individually, I think, too. That's right, yeah. The percentages change if you're a nationally chartered versus a state chartered. If my memory serves, yes, that's correct. And it's a lengthy, it's a labyrinthine process to get a national charter. What's the closest they came to failure? Because there are moments in the book where you think, is it going to work? Is it going to come through? It's a good question, and I don't, I mean, based on what I have found or what I discovered, I think once they decided, okay, we want to be a nationally chartered bank and not give away money, but still offer education and certain services to people, I think then... there was no mindset of failure amongst the group. The only thing that could have hampered it was if they were refused their charter or denied opening or how it just dragged trying to get all that permission while they were waiting, just waiting and waiting, the agonizing wait. Yeah. It does feel like time crawls as they're waiting for the federal imprimatur. Yeah. You write really convincingly about the meetings of these women early on. Thank you. How did you kind of take yourself and recreate that scene? I received from Judy Wagner, who was also a founding member, this incredible stack of minutes. And I went... Can I just pause you? Yeah. What kind of nerd do you have to be?

to say, I got an incredible stack of minutes. So a stack of minutes arrives and you're salivating at this. Yeah, this is the best thing you can get when you're researching for something like this because it puts you somewhat in the seat of, okay, I'm here. They were kind of scant. You didn't have a lot of color, if you will, but the details were really well done. And the woman who took a lot of them just, I want to say she was a book critic for the Denver Post. And so she would put sometimes kind of funny, cute little things in there that sort of made me think, this is jovial, okay, this is tense. But I loved reading through those. We hinted earlier at the snags that the Women's Bank hit in New York. How successful was Denver's when it opened and what became of it? This bank here, oh gosh, I mean, they ended up not only meeting and exceeding their opening day goal. I think it was a million in deposits. I'm sorry, I haven't read it recently. It's in there, but it's like, got to bring it up. They continued to receive deposits after that. and continued to be very successful. They ended up helping out. There was a line out the door, wasn't there? Yeah, on the opening day, there was a line out the door. Yes, and people came from all around to try to open an account. It received a lot of support also from businesses in the downtown area. There were lots of welcome ads for them in the Denver Post. And so it was celebrated, but they also were celebratory folks. They had fun. I think that also helped and sort of set them apart from other places. They were having a good time. I mean it was tough, but they were having a good time. There is not the women's bank in Denver now. Right. So where did it go? It's sold a couple of times, and I want to say it's be okay financial now, which is around the corner, I think. Yes? Yes. Okay. Oh, there she is. Thank you. We have immediate fact checks because we have living history in the audience. Yes. Okay, so Bach, be okay. I see that. Yep. Original depositors of the women's banks still have money in there. So that's very telling. So there is a legacy. Absolutely. Yeah. The last paragraph of your book hints at the struggles that persist. Just quoting you. Over coffee, just a handful of days before submitting one of my many drafts of this book, a friend of mine, a very successful woman entrepreneur, excitedly told me that she was going to try and open her own bank account after our meeting. Her story remains a common one that many women and underbanked others can relate to.

Would you reflect on that interaction with your friend? I was very surprised that she didn't have her own bank account because she had a very successful business. And it wasn't that her husband was refusing her, you know, to be able to go and do it. It just had slipped her mind all these years to think maybe I should just separate my finances a little bit from his. That was crazy to me. Yeah, I read the passage and I kept rereading it thinking, wait, are we going back in time on this one? No, no, no. This is, yeah, a couple years ago. All right, the final part of Turn the Page when Colorado Matters continues. Our audience at History Colorado Center was full of women in finance. They'll share their experiences with Grace L. Williams after a break. She's the author of Give Her Credit. You're with CPR News and KRC. You're with Colorado Matters from CPR News. I'm Ryan Warner. For a conversation about the Denver Women's Bank, there was a wealth of experience in our audience at History Colorado Center. Back to our Turn the Page event with Grace L. Williams, author of Give Her Credit. My name is Lynne Flora. I live in Lakewood, Colorado. And I met Lurley in when I worked for the Denver Chamber of Commerce back in the 80s. And Luray, once again, is the executive, the first executive and a founder of the Women's Bank. And what do you remember? Well, I remember that she was really an interesting individual, and she was one of very few women on the Denver Chamber of Commerce Board. And I was in my 20s. And I look back now and I realize just how little I understood how lucky it was. Because I really thought that women kind of had it going on. And I listen to this now and I realize, and of course other things as well, but I realized that we were so lucky to have all of the privileges, I don't know, that we had then and that we might be losing now. But I did try, my husband's right here. We bought a car last year, and I was an executive with one of the larger counties in the Denver metro area. So I am used to feeling like I am in charge. And we bought a brand new car. And they kept saying that it was in my husband's name. And I went, well, this is my car. We do. have a joint checking account and that's what we've been doing. But that's because we trust each other, okay? Not because he's the guy and I'm the woman. Anyway, they kept, I said, why the hell do you keep saying it in his name, sorry? And they said, well, that's just the way that the computer works. And I said, that's not. the way I want it to be. Okay? And they are finally starting to come around and say, Linnae, okay, it's your car. But I think they're still sending things to you, right? He's nodding yes. He's nodding yes. Linnae, thank you for sharing that. It's really nice to meet you. Thank you. And thank you very much, Grace. Oh, thank you. Thank you.

Okay, Tonya Petacru, is Tanya? Tanya Petacru, I grew up in Reit Ridge, Colorado. I live in Denver. I did have a savings account at the Women's Bank that my grandmother helped me open. Yeah, very nice. Will you tell the story of opening an account with your grandmother at the Women's Bank? She felt it was very important for all of her grandkids to have savings accounts that were in their name, that you could go deposit money from your job at. And she was proud that all of her granddaughters could do that. She sounds like a cool cat. She was a cool cat. Do you want to talk a little about her and maybe say her name? Her name was Dorothy. She went by Dot. She was a lovely lady. She loved a shop. She knew all the malls in Denver. I knew my way around Denver really well because of that.

My name is Laura Hankins. I live in Aurora, Colorado. What are the longstanding or perhaps still around businesses were funded through the Women's Bank? I know you mentioned the Wincoup Brewery and Tattered Cover were funded through loans, business loans. Do you know of any others? This is a great question about the legacy of this bank. So I know that in addition to those, you had Gusterman's Silversmiths still in business. And beyond that, I don't actually know. That's a rabbit hole I can go down later. Oh, do we have an answer from our own audience? Okay. Who are you? I'm Betty Hyde, and I produced a film on LaRaece Life a few years ago. So I know a little bit about this story, and it's an amazing story. But as far as other businesses, John Hickenlooper. He could not get his bar funded through another bank, and he went to LaRae, and his first bar was funded through the Women's Bank. And Linda Alvarado, who is an amazing business, one of the owners of the Rockies, she got a loan through the Women's Bank. Chris, nothing much came of John Hickenlooper, really. So, yeah. Thank you for answering that question. Thank you for asking it. Susan Powers directed the Denver Urban Renewal Authority. She says 1987 was an awful time for downtown with the oil and gas bust, the savings and loan crash. In one year, five department stores closed. There were massive layoffs, and downtown Denver, she adds, had the highest office vacancy in the nation. Gosh, it sounds a little familiar, but... Susan, how did the Women's Bank help with one particular project, which became a turning point? Well, in 1987, also Federico Pena was elected for his second term of office, and a year after that, after all the department stores had closed, the May Company purchased the Denver dry goods chain. and they promised they would not close the flagship store, and then a month later they had a press conference, and they closed the flagship store. So they lied to the mayor, and then they closed it. We all were worried that it was going to be demolished, so the mayor called me and said, you go out and borrow as much money as you can from the commercial banks to purchase this. I think it was $7.5 million. I have a co-work group. So between us, we have a memory. Why was this building, it's kind of worth saving? Why was this a gem? Well, the Denver Dry Goods department store was 350,000 square feet. It was the largest department store, you know, forever. And everybody had memories of going there at the tea room. They took their grandparents, took the kids to the tea room. It was just, it was something we couldn't lose. And we really did think the May Company was capable of demolishing it.

which is today would never happen. But back then, everything was closed. It was pretty miserable then. So I think that they were asking about $7.5 million for it. So I went out to all of those who was describing the men that were in charge of all the banks and pleaded with them. And they all said, no, not one banker in Denver with the large banks. And then I went to Lurray, who I should have gone to first. And she said, yeah, we'll show them. And they were the lead banker for our purchase of the Denver Dry, the department store. And the other bankers then had to fall in place because they were embarrassed. So we ended up with enough money to purchase it, and it wasn't that, I mean, Luray was wonderful, and a couple years into it, when we were still struggling to figure out what the hell to do with the building, and, you know, it was a hard time. She called a couple times and said, and I loved your word of it. She said, you know, we're not a charity. I went, oh, yeah, I know. She reminded me that this was a loan that we had to pay back, so it took us. I think five years. And my co-workers here reminded me that we also moved all of our money over to Women's Bank. Your Renewal Authority did. They became our bank. The Denver Urban Renewal Authority moved their money to the Women's Bank to support them, because they had stepped up for downtown when they were the smallest of any of the banks around, and it was pretty incredible what she did. And what of the Denver Dry Goods Building? Talk about it today. Is it condos? Is it... kombucha. You know, it started out that we were trying to make it all one thing again, because that's what it had been, department stores. We went to REI, we went to all these places, and we couldn't figure out how to do that with 350,000 square feet. So we finally... got the idea, which I think is relevant even today, to start breaking these buildings down and not try and get overwhelmed with an 18th Street building or whatever. And so the first floor of it was commercial. Second floor is T.J. Max. I mean, Waxmans, those of you remember, Waxmans was in the back of the building. They had basically half the first floor. We moved our offices into it, the Convention Visitors Bureau, visit Denver now, moved their offices into it. And then we had affordable rental 50-ish. Remember how many? 50-something low-income housing tax credit units, which were still there, and then there were condos in the front. So it was, you know, complicated, and now some of the commercial space is being converted to more affordable housing. Susan, what a testament to the legacy of the women's bank. Thank you. Absolutely. I know. They're wonderful. I wish that she was here because I could give her a hug. Thank you.

Okay, is Anne Shaver around? Hi, Ann. I'm an employment discrimination attorney, and most of my career is centered on representing women specifically in finance in gender discrimination lawsuits, mostly class actions, also some individual cases. So we've sued Morgan Stanley on behalf of female financial advisors, Goldman Sachs, on behalf of female client-facing professionals, and also folks working in Silicon Valley and venture capital. And I'm just really struck Grace by when you were talking about what the experience was like for the female executives and staff working at the bank. What a haven that must have been for them in the 70s to get to work in an environment like that. Because for my clients, even up through the 2000s, they're still having to go to strip clubs. They're still having escorts coming to the company holiday parties. It's not until the 2010s that that culture starts to change. in these banks, and they're still to this day experiencing widespread and overt discrimination in terms of pay, promotion, performance evaluations, and other material terms and conditions of work. And so, you know, I appreciate a lot about your story, but I really appreciate thinking about what that must have meant to the professionals whose careers were, you know, launched there. So thank you. Grace, thank you for being with us and thanks to our audience. Turn the page with Colorado Matters at History Colorado Center. With Grace L. Williams, author of Give Her Credit, the untold account of a women's bank that empowered a generation. We spoke last year. Items from the bank are on display at History Colorado as part of the state's sesquist centennial celebration. Okay, the next book we'll read together is titled Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, a Veteran's Memoir. That veteran is Colorado poet Kedesha Queen. As a young woman, she joined the Navy to escape poverty and despair aboard a destroyer. She encountered relentless sexual harassment and racism. She sought refuge in the written word. Her new memoir has been described as unflinching and masterfully penned and revealing the true price of being a woman at sea. So pick up a copy of Queen's new memoir between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. Then we'll see you at Library 21C in Colorado Springs, September 17th. I'll give you a heads up when tickets go on sale. But for now, crack open that book.

I'm Ryan Warner with special thanks to audio engineers Tyler Bender and Pete Kramer. From our events team, kudos to Brittany Wurgis and Kayla Montoya Manzo. You're with CPR News in KRC.