✨ Juneteenth ✨

 

Juneteenth (short for June nineteenth) is a federal holiday that celebrates and commemorates the day that the Emancipation Proclamation liberated the last of the enslaved African Americans in the city Galveston, Texas on June 19, 1865. Galveston was the last holdout for slavery in the U.S. and 250,000 men, women, and children were liberated that day. Though the Emancipation Proclamation had been signed by President Lincoln in 1865, due to the ongoing Civil War, many enslaved peoples were not immediately free. This was rectified on December 6, 1865 with the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished slavery in the United States. 

If you would like to explore more about the holiday, or the ending of slavery, we have several books that delve into the subject. Annette Gordon-Reed's small, but powerful volume of essays On Juneteenth explores the history of the end of slavery and how the struggle against inequality is still being fought. There is Ralph Ellison's novel Juneteenth, about the relationship between a senator and the African American man who raised him. The book Envisioning Emancipation explores the time of emancipation through the photographs from the antebellum period through to the 1930s, following the path of the emancipated. 

Join us in marking the freedom of all men, women, and children in the United States this June 19th!

Emancipation Day Celebrations, Richmond, Va, ca 1905