Dr. Opal Lee. Lula Briggs Galloway. Clara Peoples. We have these women to thank for bringing life to Juneteenth as we know it today. They celebrated Emancipation Day well before it came into the mainstream, and worked for decades to see Juneteenth become a nationally recognized holiday. They dedicated much of their lives to bring awareness to Juneteenth, but like many great trailblazers before them, many of us don’t know who they are.

Where does this holiday – the one that these women cared about so fervently – come from? On June 19th, 1865, Union soldiers delivered the news of the Emancipation Proclamation to enslaved people in Galveston, Texas. Though the Proclamation was issued two years earlier, freedom didn’t reach parts of the south where the Confederate presence was strong. Galveston was the last place still enduring slavery. Thus, Juneteenth commemorates the day our nation truly became free for all.

Juneteenth celebrations stretch all the way back to 1866. Celebrations of emancipation spread from Texas to states all across the country, and even outside of the U.S. In Mexico, descendants of escaped slaves – the Mascogos – celebrate Juneteenth as the day their American brethren finally obtained freedom and as a reminder of where they came from.

Through the 150 odd years since, Juneteenth celebrations have gone up and down in popularity. By 1979, every U.S. state had formally recognized the holiday in some capacity, but more than 60 percent of Americans knew “little” to “nothing at all” about Juneteenth in 2021. The new resurgence in Juneteenth celebrations, according to Brenda Elaine Stevenson, an African American history expert, is likely a result of the 2020 protests. Discussions and outrage over Black oppression, history, and rights have become part of the American zeitgeist once again. Stevenson notes that Juneteenth’s popularity rises with Black social justice initiatives. It makes sense then, why many of us are seeing Juneteenth celebrated in the mainstream for the first time. Companies like Nike, Allstate, and Google observed Juneteenth for the first time in 2020, giving their employees a day to reflect and celebrate as well as publicly commit to making their workplaces more inclusive. The first National Miss Juneteenth Pageant was held in 2020, following years of small local pageants. The holiday has been discussed more on TV and other forms of media, and was the first holiday since MLK day to be nationally recognized.

The new interest in and celebration of Juneteenth is in no small part thanks to the women mentioned at the start of this article: Opal Lee, Lula Briggs, and Clara Peoples.

Lula Briggs, a former Black Panther, founder of the African American Heritage House (AAHH), the Juneteenth Creative Cultural Center, and former CEO of the National Association of Juneteenth Lineage, brought Juneteenth Celebrations to Saginaw, Michigan. In the 1990s, she helped organize events for Juneteenth and spent decades trying to convince lawmakers to make the holiday officially recognized. She even authored a book – Juneteenth: Ring the Bell of Freedom. Briggs passed away in 2008, days before the AAHH opened its doors, and 13 years before Juneteenth became a national holiday.

When Clara Peoples first moved to Oregon and started her job in the shipyards, she was surprised to learn most of her Black coworkers had never heard of Juneteenth. On June 19, 1945, Peoples hosted one of the first Juneteenth celebrations in Oregon at her workplace. In the years that followed, the celebrations became bigger and better. In 1972, she and Ora Lee Green organized the state’s first Juneteenth Parade, which is still celebrated every year. In the months outside of June, Clara Peoples took care of her community – passing out baked goods and snacks to those in need. She founded one of the nation’s first food banks, which led to the creation of the Community Cares Foundation in 1969 to bring food and shelter to the people of Oregon.

In 2016 at the age of 89, retired schoolteacher and longtime community activist Opal Lee started “Opal’s Walks”. They were a series of walks to Washington to campaign for the recognition of Juneteenth. Her first walk was 1,400 miles – from Fort Worth, Texas to Washington, D.C. Every year since, she has hosted 2.5 mile long walks to represent the 2.5 years after emancipation it took to free slaves in Galveston. She got to see her efforts pay off when President Biden declared Juneteenth a national holiday in 2021 – Lee was even invited to the White House to celebrate the holiday’s signage.

With all this said, how can you celebrate Juneteenth?

Firstly, Juneteenth is not a holiday only Black people should celebrate. As Karlos Hill, a professor of African and African-American studies at the University of Oklahoma, discussed in an interview with Vox, Juneteenth is largely seen as part of “Black culture” rather than a part of American history. If all Americans celebrate Independence day on July 4th, all of us should celebrate the freedom of our Black citizens. Why don’t we all throw BBQs and go to Juneteenth parades?

While throwing a party is fine by me, it’s also important to recognize the importance of this holiday. There are many ways you can do so.

Supporting Black-owned businesses means you’re helping a Black individual grow wealth – something that had been utterly stripped away for generations following enslavement. Buying from a Black business gives you the chance to connect with new people, own a part of Black culture, and pave the way towards someone’s future. In a similar vein, donating to Black scholarship funds or nonprofits can help Black people break out of institutionalized oppressions.

There are a variety of books, museums, videos, and activities for you to engage with to learn more about Juneteenth. You could read Lula Briggs’ book, or look for local community events during the month of June. The National Museum of African American History and Culture hosts “Joyful Fridays” via Zoom for kids to learn about Black history and create art projects. Opal Lee also has a book for young children called Juneteenth: A Children’s Story that explains the holiday in terms kids will understand. Encouraging children – from elementary to high school – to talk to their teachers, family, or community members about race and culture is something we can do all year round.

Black Americans have only been free from slavery for a fraction of the time slavery lasted. The most important thing we as a country can do is learn accurate history. Juneteenth isn’t discussed in most history books or classrooms – it certainly isn’t celebrated in most schools. That doesn’t mean it’s not important. It’s a part of our history, and something all Americans should learn about and be proud of.

Beyond school, it’s important to look at the broader meaning of Juneteenth. Enslaved people in Texas gained their freedom two years after the Emancipation Proclamation. Confederate Troops fought tooth and nail until the very end to keep Black people in bondage. When Union Generals arrived to set the enslaved free, they told them they should “remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages” instead of celebrate their freedom and finally reunite with loved ones. The progress built by the formerly enslaved during Reconstruction was all but demolished by the Jim Crow era. Today, America pretends racism is over and that Black people are “crying wolf” on matters of police violence, systemic poverty, and discrimination.

Juneteenth reminds us that African American freedom is not absolute. It has been conditional and slow moving for all of our history. In every decade, we can find efforts of social justice stifled or made to seem unnecessary. The remnants of slavery exist in uneducated attitudes. But Juneteenth also reminds us that despite it all, Black Americans have been able to create their own success – completely on their own. No matter how you choose to celebrate Juneteenth this year, think about all that has happened to bring us to this moment, and how bright the future can be if we fight forward together.

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