George Washington Carver Day Nursery Records

The George Washington Carver Day Nursery was Denver’s first racially integrated daycare center, serving the needs of working parents in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood since 1916. Their early motto was that the school was "A Haven for the Children of Working Mothers." The nursery was founded by the Negro Woman’s Club Association of Denver in their clubhouse building, in response to the death of two neighborhood white children who died unattended at home while their parents worked. The original club building, located at 2357 Clarkson, housed the nursery school, a residential home for working women and their children, and multiple African American women’s social clubs. Both the school and the home charged low, sliding-scale fees for their services, and the women’s clubs supplemented this community service mission through club dues, donations, and fundraisers.

Eventually educating and caring for children from 2.5 to 12 years old, the school was an integral part of the Five Points neighborhood, and later the Whittier and City Park West neighborhoods. Many influential members of the area’s African American community served on the board of directors, and provided additional financial support to the school. The school was also partially supported for several decades by the United Way Fund.

In 1966, after fifty years of serving Denver families on Clarkson, the school moved to a new location at 2270 Humboldt, where the school remains in operation today. In 1972, George Washington Carver Day Nursery merged with several other day cares to form the Mile High Child Care Association, but the school maintained its unique name. The school has provided care and education for tens of thousands of Denver’s children for more than a century.

Erma L. Ford served the school as executive director from 1947-1980.