# Niwot Living History > A community-led platform in Niwot, Colorado dedicated to historical truth-telling, tribal relationship building, and collaborative cultural projects honoring Chief Nowoo3 (Left Hand) and the Arapaho and Cheyenne peoples. This site documents current community work in Niwot around truthful history, Indigenous art, cultural programming, and relationship building with Arapaho and Cheyenne partners. It is curated by Phillip Yates. Site: https://niwotlivinghistory.org ## Pages - [Home](/): Homepage introducing truthful history, Indigenous art, film, and relationship-building projects rooted in Niwot and the Boulder Valley. - [About](/about): Explains the purpose of the platform, its curator, and the collaborative practice behind its public history and cultural work. - [Building Relationships](/relationships): Documents local relationship-building with Arapaho and Cheyenne partners through gatherings, dialogue, historical accountability, and shared civic projects. - [Arapaho and Cheyenne Perspectives](/arapaho-cheyenne-perspectives): Contemporary Arapaho and Cheyenne perspectives on Niwot, Boulder Valley, Chief Nowoo3 / Chief Niwot / Left Hand, language, place, memory, and relationship-building. - [Niwot, Boulder County, and the Road to Sand Creek](/history): Source-based settler-record timeline tracing white settlement, territorial policy, Boulder County militia activity, Fort Chambers, Company D, and the road to the Sand Creek Massacre. - [Authorship and Accountability](/authorship): Phillip Yates's positionality statement, source practices, editorial responsibility, and boundaries around Tribal representation and data sovereignty. - [Elder Conversations and Oral History Videos](/elder-conversations-videos): Eight attributed video conversations with Southern Arapaho Elder Fred Mosqueda and Southern Cheyenne Elder Chester Whiteman, recorded in Niwot on March 17, 2025. - [Principles of Authentic Tribal Consultation](/principles-authentic-tribal-consultation): Practical guide to authentic tribal consultation, inherent sovereignty, municipal accountability, and respectful engagement along Colorado's Front Range. - [Principles — Source Record & Press Archive](/principles-source-record): Supplementary source record and press archive supporting the Principles of Authentic Tribal Consultation. - [Library](/library): Curated library of videos, museums, tribal nation links, books, and reports for deeper study of Arapaho, Cheyenne, and Boulder Valley history. - [Niwot Native Art Market](/art-market): Event page for the artist-first Niwot Native Art Market featuring Indigenous artists, cultural exchange, and direct public engagement in Cottonwood Square. - [Feature Article: 100% Native-Made, 100% Artist-First](/art-market-article): Long-form feature on the Niwot Native Art Market, Tom Myer's artist-first model, and the market's role in Arapaho and Cheyenne relationship-building. - [Cottonwood Square Murals](/murals): Overview of the four Indigenous-created public murals in downtown Niwot and the artists whose work brings Native history into the town's visual landscape. - [Tree Carvings](/tree-carvings): Community preservation project for Eddie Running Wolf's restored sculptures and the proposed canopy shelter at Lefthand Valley Grange Park. - [Film Festival](/film-festival): Independent Niwot film festival initiative centered on Indigenous voices, immigrant stories, Colorado filmmakers, and civic bridge-building. - [Sand Creek Massacre: 150 Year Remembrance — Video Archive](/sand-creek-videos): Complete 17-segment video archive of the 2014 Sand Creek Massacre sesquicentennial symposium co-sponsored by the National Park Service and the National Museum of the American Indian. ## History Pathway Chapters - [Chapter 01 · Homelands](/history/homelands): Arapaho and Cheyenne peoples have lived in the Boulder Valley and across the Front Range since time immemorial — wintering, hunting, and traveling on lands later colonized as Boulder. - [Chapter 02 · Gold Rush & Dispossession](/history/gold-rush-and-dispossession): In 1858–1859 prospectors struck gold on Southern Arapaho wintering grounds. Boulder, Denver, and the Front Range were founded as settler claims on land the United States had recognized as Arapaho and Cheyenne territory. - [Chapter 03 · The Fort Wise Treaty & Colorado](/history/fort-wise-treaty-and-escalation): In February 1861, federal agents secured six Cheyenne and Arapaho signatures on the Treaty of Fort Wise, an agreement that Chief Nowoo3 and the majority of tribal leaders rejected. Following the outbreak of the Civil War, Territorial Governor William Gilpin funded the construction of Camp Weld and raised the First Colorado Regiment, which would defeat Confederate forces near present-day Glorieta, New Mexico. In November 1861, the Boulder County Commissions began their first meetings to levy taxes, map voting townships and record property deeds. - [Chapter 04 · Expansion and the Year of Hunger](/history/federal-expansion-and-the-year-of-hunger): In 1862–1863, Governor John Evans rejected Neva's protest of the Fort Wise Treaty, imposed a deadline for removal to Sand Creek, and used a failed council as proof of conspiracy while drought and hunger devastated the Southern Arapaho and Cheyenne. - [Chapter 05 · Boulder County & Sand Creek Massacre](/history/road-to-sand-creek): Throughout 1864, Cheyenne and Arapaho peace chiefs sought peace amid conflict provoked by the First Colorado Regiment. Boulder County's Company D mustered at Fort Chambers and participated in the Sand Creek Massacre on November 29, 1864. - [Chapter 06 · Investigations & Condemnation](/history/investigations-and-condemnation): Following the Sand Creek Massacre, returning troops received a heroes' welcome in Denver, where theatrical productions exhibited Indigenous scalps and captive children to cheering audiences. As a massive military coalition of Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Sioux warriors launched devastating retaliatory raids across the plains, local settlers mobilized to politically defend the massacre. Despite procedural challenges and intense public hostility, a military commission in Denver and a congressional committee in Washington gathered sworn testimony from dissenting officers, eventually releasing reports that thoroughly documented the atrocities and condemned the military commanders. - [Chapter 07 · Removal & Niwot's Founding](/history/removal-from-colorado): After the Sand Creek Massacre, the federal government formally repudiated the attack in the 1865 Treaty of the Little Arkansas, yet never paid the reparations it promised to the survivors. Two years later, the Medicine Lodge Treaty forced the Southern Arapaho and Southern Cheyenne to cede their remaining lands in Colorado and relocate to a reservation in Indian Territory. During the 1870s, as military campaigns pushed the last remaining Arapaho and Cheyenne families south to the new reservation, white settlers founded the town of Niwot, naming it for the Arapaho chief whose people had been permanently driven from the valley. ## Optional - [Full text for AI ingestion](/llms-full.txt): Single-file plain-text summary of every page for one-shot AI ingestion. - [RSS feed](/rss.xml): Feed for AI crawlers and readers that prefer RSS discovery. - [Sitemap](/sitemap.xml): XML sitemap of all public pages.