History
Julia Davis Park has its roots in the 1862 journey of two orphans, Thomas and Frank Davis, who traveled to the Boise area from Cincinnati, Ohio, with hopes of joining in the widely publicized gold rush in the Idaho Territory. The brothers staked a claim and mined for a year, before building a cabin in 1863 on the Cottonwood Creek near the site of the present Julia Davis Park. On July 4, 1863, Fort Boise was established and shortly after, the Davis brothers along with seven friends met in the Davis’ cabin and planned the formation of the City of Boise. According to one of the friends, William Lowery Ritchie, “in the summer of 1863 the soldiers came and established the garrison; that was some time early in July. It was about that time we met in our cabin and formed a town co.” Thomas Davis came to play a pivotal role in the development of Boise as a city and sought to help attract visitors and pioneers to the valley. With his mining claim being less than profitable, Davis turned to the promotion of agriculture by planting 7,000 apple trees on his land along the Boise River. Additionally, he started buying up land in the valley from the United States land office, receiving Cash Certificate No. 1 for 160 acres (0.65 km2) in 1868 when the first land office opened up. Within several years, Davis went on to purchase the first water rights in the valley, as well as an additional 1,150 acres (4.7 km2) from the federal government along the foothills and where the town of Garden City was developed. In 1871, Davis married Julia McCrumb, who had travelled to Boise from Ontario, Canada, to visit family in 1869.
Near the end of the century, in 1899, the Davis couple offered a section of their orchard lands for use as a park, but the city was hesitant to act on this offer. They again offered a deed for a park in February 1907. Finally, after the death of Julia Davis in September, presumably from typhoid, the city paid one dollar to Thomas Davis as he deeded 40 acres (160,000 m2) acres of land to the city in memory of his wife in November 1907. He required that the land be utilized for public purposes and that the park would be “always and forever” known as Julia Davis Park. Interestingly, Davis enforced this by including in the deed a stipulation that the land would return to the Davis heirs if the property were ever used for any other purpose. The next year, in 1908, Davis died the morning after a much anticipated Damrosch concert. His death was a sad event to the many Boiseans who attended the funeral and respected the couple’s philanthropy.
In the decade following Davis’s death, the city worked to improve the park and upgrade the land by adding walls, planting vegetation, and creating a general development plan with the help of Arthur L. Peck in 1912. In 1916, the Boise Zoo, now known as Zoo Boise, was created when a monkey was found in the desert near Mountain Home. During the next decade, the park expanded with a series of land donations from the Davis estate in 1922, 1929, 1931, and 1932. During this time, a bandshell was built in the park in 1928, and the Boise Zoo expanded in 1929. In 1931, the Morrison-Knudsen Company built the Capitol Boulevard Memorial Bridge next to Julia Davis Park. As the economy improved following the Great Depression, Julia Davis Park saw the dedication of a rose garden in 1939, and the expansion of the park to its current borders from Capitol Boulevard to Broadway Avenue in 1940 and 1941.
Meat rationing as a result of World War II occurred also in 1941, which put away meat-eating animals in Zoo Boise. In 1950, the Idaho Historical Museum was established on the park grounds, and Union Pacific donated Engine 2195, called "Big Mike", to Julia Davis Park in 1959. In 1966, the city began developing the Boise River Greenbelt, and in 1972, the Boise Gallery of Art underwent an expansion. The Bob Gibb Friendship Bridge was built to connect the greenbelt, as well as the park, with Boise State University across the river in 1980. The Idaho Historical Museum grew in 1982, and in 1986, the Gallery of Art was renamed the Boise Art Museum during a renovation. By 1997, the art museum expanded to 34,800 square feet (3,230 m2). A year later, the Idaho Black History Museum was established in the Old St. Baptist Church in 1998. In 2002, Jerry Snodgrass created a statue memorializing pioneers to the Boise area such as Julia Davis. A century after the park was established, a Centennial Celebration took place on June 23, 2007, and the city began a “Second Century” campaign to improve the park.
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)