Los Seis de Boulder were six Chicanx student activists who died in May 1974 during weeks-long occupation of Temporary Building 1 on CU Boulder’s campus, in which students demanded continued funding and growth for the Educational Opportunity Programs that brought Mexican-American students and other marginalized students to campus beginning in 1968.
On May 27, 1974, Una Jaakola, Reyes Martinez, and Neva Romero were killed in a car bomb at Chautauqua Park. On May 29, Francisco Dougherty, Heriberto Teran, and Florencio Granado were killed in a car bomb in a parking lot near 28th and Canyon. Antonio Alcantar was severely injured in that explosion. The circumstances surrounding their deaths were never adequately investigated, and the cases were never solved.
In early 2019, students at CU Boulder along with community members and surviving family members created a sculpture with portraits of each of the students and alum who died, that was installed in front of Temporary Building 1 on campus. In response to the sculpture project, CU Boulder announced an Art in Public Space Committee and the CU Boulder History Project on January 17, 2020. On March 6, 2020, the administration announced the sculpture would remain indefinitely temporary. On September 16, 2020, they finally announced the sculpture would remain permanently in place and cared for by the University Libraries’ department of Special Collections, Archives and Preservation. Thank you to everyone who sent letters of support and put pressure on CU Boulder’s administration to keep this important memorial permanently in front of TB-1. On September 21, 2020, UMAS y MECHA wrote an official statement about this historic moment.
In 2020, many of the same participants created a second sculpture for Los Seis which was temporarily installed at the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art and permanently installed at 17th and Pearl in downtown Boulder.
Stream Symbols of Resistance
Read From Occupation to Reclamation: The Legacy of Los Seis de Boulder