About Denver Free Spanish Network (formerly Denver Spanish Meetup)

The Denver Free Spanish Network is simply anyone who wants to get together and speak Spanish. It's free and open to anyone.

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EL GRUPO CERCA DE 1988

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The DFSN has been meeting every week since 1982. We now have over 1,500 members and have meetings several times each week in various locations around the Denver Metro area. Our members are at all levels of Spanish-speaking ability, from people who are just beginning to learn the language, to native speakers from various countries around the world. We have members from every age group -- young and old. Rich or poor, Black or White -- we don't care. Everyone is welcome, and always has been. We meet in member's homes, in coffee shops, in bars, and in restaurants. Our meetings are typically free -- and always open to the public. There are no instructors, so please feel free to bring a dictionary. If you happen to forget your dictionary, don't worry -- everyone in the group is very friendly and very helpful, with words, phrases and idioms from around the globe.

Check out the calendar (on the left). It has all of the details on the upcoming meetings. I'm sure you will find a meeting in your part of town in the next few days.

TOP TEN facts about the Denver Free Spanish Network:

1) The DFSN has meetings most nights of the week. Meetings are usually from 7:30pm-10pm, but always check the calendar (on the left) for details. Sometimes they start a little earlier or end a little earlier than this.

2) Our members are at all levels of Spanish-speaking ability. We have lots of people who are just beginning to learn the language, but we also have lots of native speakers from various countries from around the world. Perhaps our largest group is people who don't want to lose the Spanish-speaking ability that they have already achieved. We have members from every age group, occupation, background, and part of town. It is an amazing mix -- and every night you will meet new people!

3) Our meetings are always very informal. This means that you can come at any time during the stated hours and leave at your convenience. But please do not show up any earlier than the stated start time, and be sure to leave by the ending time. You're always welcome to bring friends with you -- no matter what their Spanish speaking level happens to be.

4) None of our meetings has an instructor, organizer, teacher, director, translator, professor, coordinator, leader, moderator, facilitator -- or anyone else "in charge". In other words, you are on your own. But that's why it's free! You just show up and talk to the other people that also happen to be there. Your task is to find someone else at the level at which you want to speak (or listen), and interested in the topics you want to discuss. The process can be challenging, but it is well worth it. You just might spend the evening talking about the current political situation in Bolivia with someone who grew up there -- and chances are you didn't even know there were political events of any importance in Bolivia!

5) If you happen to forget your dictionary, don't worry. Not only is there usually one within reach, but everyone in the group is very friendly and very helpful, with words, phrases and idioms from around the globe. In fact, they will be your best teacher!

6) Our meetings are free and open to anyone. Occasionally, there is a special event that has an entrance fee, but these are minimal and clearly noted on the calendar. Sometimes, we meet in restaurants, museums and other locations, but never anything fancy or expensive. If you plan to attend a meeting in a restaurant, etc. be prepared to spend a little money -- or drink water.

7) Typically we meet in members' homes. We average between 4 and 30 people at most Denver Free Spanish Network meetings. Many hosts provide some refreshments, but if you want something to drink, it's best to bring your own beverage. If you have some food or drink to share, that's even better!

8) We are always interested in new places to meet. If you have an idea for a new location for a meeting, please let us know. We are always open to ideas and suggestions. If you can accommodate the group in your home for one or more meetings, please let us know. Some people do it on a regular basis, but if you just what to try it out, that's fine. Hosting meetings is a lot of fun! Just contact us and we can chat about the details.

9) Not all Denver Free Spanish Network meetings are listed on this website. If you want a complete listing of all Denver Free Spanish Network meetings, you'll need to subscribe to our bi-monthly calendar. This is mailed directly to your home and contains meeting details, upcoming events, and other interesting items of information. Just make a check out to Isobel McGowan for $10 for a year subscription to our calendar. Mail it to:
Isobel McGowan
3600 Clay Street
Denver, CO 80211

10) Over the years, many people have asked me how the Denver Free Spanish Network got started. Here are the facts, as best as I can recall.

Tricky Dick

The Denver Free Spanish Network owes much to Richard Nixon.

That might seem odd, but it’s true. I know. I was there. Let me explain.

In 1968, I went to college at the University of Denver. That was at the height of the Vietnam War. At that time, I didn’t really know what the Vietnam War was all about. I was familiar with geography and I knew where Vietnam was located, and I knew we had soldiers over there fighting, but the details of the war were another matter. Being on a college campus in a country with an active draft, I soon learned more than I ever imagined about the war. The reality that I could be on the front line in a matter of weeks hit home!

Many other students had the same concern, and there were constant protests against the War around the country. Then on April 30, 1970, Dick Nixon, as Commander-in-Chief, on his own, without Congressional approval or notice, decided to invade Cambodia, and all hell broke loose. Students from the Atlantic to the Pacific realized that an expanding war meant disaster for them. In protest, campuses across the country exploded. The deadly Kent State protests were just the first, and they quickly spread to hundreds of other colleges and universities. It might be hard to believe, but on May 6, the students at the University of Denver shut down the University and created a community of their own, called Woodstock West.

A week later, the Governor of Colorado, John Love, decided to call in hundreds of National Guard troops to restore order -- bayonets and all -- no kidding. The end result is that because of Nixon’s insanity, we now have the War Powers Act and the Denver Free Spanish Network! Quite an interesting combination. I’ll let you decide which has proven to be more successful over the years.

Denver Free University

The DU students were not just a bunch of pot-smoking, drugged-up, hippie protesters. We are talking about DU, after all. The students were there to learn. In fact, because the University was shut down, the students set up their own college. They named their new institution, “Denver Free University”, for obvious reasons. It was designed to teach anyone about anything at any time, completely free of charge. I remember being handed their first flyer. It was just a single sheet of paper with a half-dozen “courses”, covering politics, the Vietnam war, the military industrial complex, womens’ rights, minority issues and more. My first thought was “you can’t just set up a school on your own”. But the seed was planted. The idea that anyone could create their own school was set in my mind.

University of Colorado

Several years later, after getting an MS degree, I found myself back in school. I wanted to learn about the strange new devices called “computers”. I applied to the CU graduate program in computers which, at that time, was in the Engineering Department. However, the most basic computer class had a requirement of one year of calculus. So I took a year of calculus. As you might suspect, we never used any calculus in the computer class. Still I wanted a degree in computers. Then I was told that admission to the program required three years of a foreign language. I thought, no problem since I had two years of French and two years of Latin. I thought that would be enough, but not for CU. They wanted me to have three years of the same language. So I could have 30 years of linguistics, but it would not be good enough for CU. Rather than trying to find classes in Latin, I decided to take three years of Spanish -- or at least that was my plan. I aced my first and second year classes but then I ran into other roadblocks.

Lisa and Metropolitan State College

My last Spanish class at CU was during the Interterm -- that’s the month between the Fall and Spring semesters, AKA December. It was an intensive Spanish class, meeting four hours every day. It was tough, but La Profesora, Lisa, was wonderful. She was determined to do whatever she could to help each of us learn as much as we could. She was a woman on a mission. We were going to learn Spanish, and she was determined that we would thoroughly enjoy the experience -- a much more daunting task! Well, everyone had a great time -- despite the long hours -- and we all learned a lot. In fact, it was during this class that I had my first dream en Espanol. I’ve heard that there is some significance to this, but I’m still not sure what it is.

But during the next semester – 3rd year – I knew I had to leave CU behind. I had no alternative. Despite doing great in the first two years of Spanish, the third year students were mostly native-speakers and way above my ability. At the same time I found out that CU would not accept any of my graduate school credit to cover undergraduate class requirements. That was the straw that broke the camel’s back. They wanted even more of my money and time after working for three years to get into their stupid program. Fed up, I decided to move across the street to Metro State, where they would accept all of my graduate classes and my two and a half years of Spanish. They even accepted all of my classes from CU. I took additional courses in computers, math, statistics, biology, psychology, and business and graduated with a BS in Health Research.

Judith and Westword

While at Metro, I was wondering what to do with my interest in Spanish. I knew I would be wasting my time taking advanced college-level classes, but I didn't want to lose the Spanish-speaking ability that I had achieved. Looking at Westword one day, I noticed a simple ad. “Anyone interested in speaking Spanish...”. I responded. Just three people showed up at Judith’s apartment the first night. We decided to meet again the next week, but I was the only one to return. Still, Judith and I were determined to practice Spanish and we continued to meet, each week, for several months. Eventually Judith became bored with my limited Spanish-speaking ability -- so did I -- and we pondered our possibilities. I was teaching photography at DFU at the time (for free, of course) and I had an idea. We could list a Spanish “class” in the DFU catalog. We would call it the Spanish Conversational Group. There would be no instructor, and we would meet on Wednesday nights. The “course” was a great success and, for several years, we had an infusion of new students with each new DFU catalog.

The Learning Annex and Colorado Free University

Denver Free University was an amazing place. But then someone got greedy. A business called “The Learning Annex”, from New York, decided to come into town with the stated purpose of putting DFU out of business -- no kidding. In response, DFU changed their name -- no kidding. Soon, no one in Denver knew who was what, but it didn’t make any difference at that point. There just wasn’t enough interest to keep both institutions in business. Unfortunately for us, this commercial conflict had a direct impact on our group. DFU was very short on cash, due to the competition, and they started pressuring us to start charging tuition for our free Spanish “course”. Of course, I refused. We don’t have any instructors, so I couldn’t see any reason to start charging people to attend our meetings. The DFU class coordinator, Tracy Dunning, told me to get lost. I did.

After so many years of teaching at Denver Free University, I was so ticked-off that I decided to change the name of the Spanish Conversational Group to the “Denver Free Spanish Network”.

But, despite the conflict, the Denver Free Spanish Network has the distinction of being the last free course that was ever offered at Denver Free University. So DFU still lives on today in some ways -- a remnant of the 1970’s when I got a small handbill on the DU campus at the height of the Vietnam War.

The Learning Annex soon slithered back to New York City, but DFU went belly up, too. It declared bankruptcy (and was eventually resurrected as CFU), but the Denver Free Spanish Network continued to flourish. We soon were having additional meetings every Monday night. Then we created El Calendario, so that everyone would know where and when we were meeting. Then Isobel suggested sending calendars out to people through the mail, and we were on a roll. Now we have the Internet and many other ways to engage new people and to stay in touch with them. It’s been a long, strange trip.

The DFSN is the product of many wonderful people over many years. Tricky Dick (who taught me that I could do anything I damn well pleased), Lisa (who taught me that learning Spanish can be fun), Judith (who taught me the importance of advertising), Isobel, Clarko, Barb, Jack, Lulu, Ricardo, Eduardo, Carlos & Jo, Gabby, Pedro, Kim, Daniel, Alberto, Connie, David and many others helped to start the group and have kept it going strong ever since. In 1988, Westword honored the DFSN as the “Best Casual Way to Learn a Language.” It doesn’t get much better than that!

We all change over the years -- hopefully for the better. DFSN is now over 1,500 members strong, and a new generation of volunteers is adding new energy. Thanks to their efforts, the group will continue to grow in ways that the old-timers, like me, never imagined. El Grupo has meetings nearly every night of the week, from Lakewood to Aurora, and from Highlands Ranch to Westminster. I'm sure there is a meeting in your area, soon. When you get a chance, please plan to attend -- and you’ll see why we have been so successful for over 25 years.