Ivy Ha never imagined her life would be in a museum exhibit.
“I think, ‘A lot of people have better stories than me. Why is my story important?’” she said.
Ha is one of almost 40 community members who contributed oral stories to the “Big Dreams in Denver’s Little Saigon,” now open at the History Colorado Center. She is a Chinese-Vietnamese refugee who arrived in Colorado at age 17 in 1979 after the fall of Saigon. The now-retired business owner ran the Modern Boutique hair salon on Federal Boulevard for nearly four decades.
“I think I opened it in 1983 or ‘84, around then,” Ha told Denverite. “And the first year, it was tough. First year was pretty much no customers at all.”
“Big Dreams in Denver’s Little Saigon” documents the area of West Denver along Federal Boulevard between Alameda and Mississippi avenues from the 1980s through today.
The Far East Center is the most well-known part of Little Saigon and was designated an official state historic landmark by History Colorado last year. That commemoration led to the creation of the Little Saigon Memory Project, which is now a part of the physical exhibit at History Colorado.
