Welcome to the most beautiful time of year in Boise.

It was October the first time I visited Boise thinking I might move here. My mom and I were on a tour at BSU and we ditched halfway through to walk the Greenbelt. We ended up in Julia Davis Park, sitting on a bench. I remember that both of us could not shut up about how stunningly beautiful everything around us was.

The Greenbelt and Boise’s parks are easily one of its best features. Besides the fact that there are so many parks (more than 100 throughout the valley), the seamless connection and accessibility to such a large amount of open space is truly something special.

You may or may not know that many of Boise’s parks are named after women who played an important role in shaping Boise into the beautiful city it is today. As the trees are beginning to put on their annual autumn show, we are exploring four of Boise’s parks and the women whose namesake they bear.

Julia Davis

The story of Boise’s parks begins with Julia Davis.

Julia McCrumb traveled from Canada to the Boise Valley in 1869 to visit relatives. There she met her future husband, Tom Davis. Tom was one of Boise’s “founding fathers” and helped lay out the town site that would eventually become the city of Boise. Tom and Julia married two years after meeting and settled on a large swath of land along the Boise River.

Julia Davis became known for her kindness within the growing community and gracious hospitality toward travelers. She welcomed weary wagon trains to rest on their lush property – a lovely respite after months of traveling through hot, high desert climate. By 1899, the city of Boise had grown enough to need a public park. Tom and Julia Davis offered a 40-acre section of their land by the river for consideration, but it was turned down by City Council. Not all Boise citizens were on board with a public park and worried it would be too costly to transform the patch of land along the river into a useful public property.

As the fight for Boise’s first park wore on, Julia became sick with Typhoid fever and eventually passed in September of 1907. Shortly after her passing, the city agreed to purchase the 40-acre parcel from Tom Davis from $1 and with the condition that it will always and forever be a public park. Boise’s first public park is named in honor of Julia Davis, forever preserving her kind heart and continuing her legacy of welcoming all who land in Boise.

Today, Julia Davis Park has grown to 89 acres and is home to Zoo Boise, Boise Art Museum, Idaho Black History Museum, Idaho State Historical Museum, Discovery Center of Idaho, and a stunning seasonal Rose Garden. There is a sculpture in the park by local artist Jerry L. Snodgrass, which depicts Julia Davis holding a wooden bucket of apples in her left hand with a single apple in her right hand, outstretched in offering to a young barefoot girl.

Ann Morrison

Anna Daly grew up in Quartzburg, Idaho, a small mining town the mountains of the Boise Basin best known for the Gold Hill Mine. She moved to Boise in 1903, at the age of 16, to a house in the North End on 19th Street. She finished high school and became a secretary in the Idaho Capitol. In 1914, she met and married Harry W. Morrison.

Harry was co-founder of the esteemed civil engineering company Morrison-Knudsen, known for the construction of Bogus Basin, over 100 major dams including the Hoover Dam, NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), and many other projects. Ann took advantage of the opportunity to travel the world with her husband, visiting current and potential projects in more than 45 countries, thus earning her the nickname of “the First Lady of Construction.”

Ann was known for her kind spirit and generosity. She was front and center in much of Morrison-Knudsen’s business dealings, and did so with graciousness and grit. She also took great civic interest locally and was a friendly neighbor to all. She died of leukemia in 1957 at the age of 70. A memorial printed in a magazine read, “…More than a memory is such a treasured presence as hers, for its truth is timeless and selfless love is more enduring than even the great dams her people have built. Truly, they were her people and she was their friend, co-worker, and champion.”

Shortly after Anna’s death, Harry purchased 153-acres on the south side of the Boise River in between Capitol Blvd and Americana Blvd. A team of Morrison-Knudsen workers, neighborhood clubs, and individuals assembled to transform the land into a beautiful park in honor of Anna Daly Morrison and the 43 years she shared with her husband, Harry. It was dedicated to the city on June 7, 1959 and is still Boise’s largest park.

Kristin Armstrong

Kristin Armstrong is Boise local and professional road cyclist. She started her professional athletic career at the age of 17 as a Junior Olympian in Swimming, then a distance runner in college, and then completed the Hawaii Ironman World Championship as a triathlete. In 2001, at the age of 27, she was diagnosed with osteoarthritis in both hips. She turned to cycling as therapy, not knowing this would mark the beginning of some of her greatest accomplishments.

Three years later, Kristin placed 8th in the women’s road cycling race at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens. At the 2008 Summer Olympics in China, she won the gold medal in the women’s road time trial after finishing in under 35 minutes. She successfully defended her Olympic title in the individual time trial at the 2012 Olympics in London, becoming the oldest rider to win an Olympic time trial.

In 2016, she made history (again) after coming out of retirement to win the gold medal in the women’s individual time trial at the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Kristin became the first rider to ever win three gold medals in the same race and the oldest female to win an Olympic medal.

A 28-acre park in Boise’s historic East End now bears her name. Originally created in 1918 as Boise Tourist Park Campground, the city purchased the land to become Memorial Park in 1927. It was renamed to honor Boise’s badass, Kristin Armstrong, in 2016.

Bethine Church

Bethine Clark was born in Mackay, Idaho, to a family prominent in Idaho politics. Her father and uncle were both elected to serve terms as Mayor of Idaho Falls, then as Governor of Idaho. When her father was elected Governor, the family moved to Boise where Bethine attended Boise High. Here she met and befriended Frank Church, who would become her future husband.

After high school, Bethine and Frank kept in touch writing letters while he was away at college, then serving in World War II. In 1946, Frank Church returned from duty and proposed to Bethine. They were married on June 21, 1947 in the mountains east of Stanley.

Frank Church would go on to become a U.S. Senator and ran for president in 1976. Bethine may not have been the center of attention, but she was an undeniable driving force behind her husband’s political career and had many of her own political and civic accomplishments that continued long after her husband’s death in 1984. She was active in all of her husband’s campaigns and public life, which earned her the nickname “Idaho’s third senator,” and served on many committees and organizations.

Bethine Church founded the Sawtooth Society – which successfully lobbied to protect the Sawtooth National Recreation Area – and also chaired The Frank Church Institute, was a governing council member of The Wilderness Society, a member of the Idaho Conservation League, and served on dozens of other boards, councils, and committees. She received an honorary doctorate degree from Boise State University and The Wilderness Society’s highest honor in 2009. Bethine died at age 90 on December 21, 2013.

The Bethine Church River Trail was dedicated to the late political and environmental conservation maven in 2009, before her passing. The 1.6-mile pedestrian-only pathway winds through a 24-acre natural area along the Boise River, near Barber Park. The area is home to riparian habitat, wildlife nesting areas and several small irrigation canals that have been transformed into small streams for fish.

PS – the city has a guided Nature Walk on the Bethine Church River Trail tomorrow, October 6 from 5:30-6:30pm. It’s free! Bring your binos for some bird watching. Also, no dogs or bikes allowed in this area.

Cherie Buckner-Webb

Boise’s newest park is Cherie Buckner-Webb Park, located at the corner of 11th and Bannock in downtown Boise. It’s the first park in downtown Boise and continues the legacy of naming parks after amazing women who have helped better the city of Boise.

Cherie Buckner-Webb is a 5th generation Idahoan and is the first Black woman to serve in the Idaho Legislature. Cherie was elected to the Idaho House of Representatives in 2010 and to the Idaho State Senate in 2012, 2014, 2016, and 2018, where she served through 2020. She was an integral part of preserving the St. Paul Baptist Church, which is now the Idaho Black History Museum. Cherie has also served on numerous local and national boards and committees, including the Women’s and Children’s Alliance, Idaho Human Rights Education Coalition, and the Andrus Center for Public Policy.

Cherie is known for her tireless activism, profound public speaking, and kind spirit. Boise’s new park bears her name, honoring the woman who has worked on improving quality of life in Boise for all for decades. The new park is quickly becoming known for its massive pink tree swing.

Some more Boise parks named after great women:

• Kathryn Albertson Park
• Alta Harris Park
• Dona Larsen Park
• Esther Simplot Park
• Bernardine Quinn Riverside Park
• Marinanne Williams Park
• Golda Harris Nature Preserve
• Helen B. Lowder Park
• Laura Moore Cunningham Arboretum

Hope y'all go out and enjoy some parks this week/weekend/month/season. It's truly the best time of year to go sit on a park bench, or even right in the grass, and do nothing more than look around. Also, you deserve to do nothing for a sec. We all do <3

Thanks for reading!

With love from Boise,

Marissa