The Archaeology of the River Street Neighborhood: A Multi-racial Urban Region of Refuge in Boise, Idaho

Abstract

Prior to the Civil Rights movement, most cities in the United States had at least one racially segregated neighborhood--a place where the "others" lived. This was typically a geographic location designated by the European American community as the area non-European Americans could reside. In Boise, Idaho, non-Whites lived in the River Street Neighborhood, a place where African Americans, Basque, Japanese, Eastern Europeans, and poor Whites established homes and businesses. River Street existed as a segregated enclave where, out away from prying eyes, African Americans, Basques, and other non-White people could escape overt segregation. This multi-disciplinary dissertation examines the River Street Neighborhood as a 'region of refuge'—a geographic place where residents formed a subculture where many of the racial mores of the time could be subverted and, in many ways, exploited. The dissertation also addresses the ways material culture, oral histories, archival documents, and community based participatory research (CPBR) can coalesce for advocacy for the preservation of minority historic properties.