Juneteenth:1865-2021 [View all]

[BumRushDaShow]

A very good documentary done by KHOU TV in Houston last year - https://www.khou.com/article/entertainment/events/juneteenth/juneteenth-1865-2021-wednesday-at-8-pm-on-khou-11/285-f6bab62b-3ed3-41eb-9475-9d75c75480a7

And as a note, just this morning I saw an article done by CNN that was picked up by one of the local papers here (Philly Tribune) that after all these years, povided a lightbulb moment from one sentence) -

What to know about Juneteenth now that it's a federal holiday

By Harmeet Kaur, CNN

Updated 6:56 AM ET, Sat June 18, 2022
(snip)

It celebrates the end of slavery

Juneteenth -- also known as Juneteenth Independence Day, Freedom Day and Emancipation Day -- commemorates the end of slavery in the United States.

A blend of the words June and nineteenth, it marks June 19, 1865: the day that Union Army Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger rode into Galveston, Texas, and issued General Order No. 3, proclaiming that the enslaved African Americans there were free.

"The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free," the order read. "This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor."

Freedom for the enslaved people of Galveston, Texas, came two-and-a-half years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which couldn't be enforced in areas under Confederate control. It also came about two months after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to the Union Army at Appomattox Court House, Virginia -- an event generally considered to be the end of the Civil War.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/18/us/juneteenth-federal-holiday-what-to-know-cec/index.html

(emphasis mine)

That one last sentence with the part - "came about two months after Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to the Union Army", meaning it took 2 years to find, scrape out, and dispose of the scum leaders of the Confederacy before the the U.S. could force compliance of all states to the Emancipation Proclamation, and Galveston in (where else) Texas, became the very last to relent and accept the order (which I knew, but not why and the circumstances, outside of a transportation issue to get the word out).

My complaint about the teaching of history in my schools was the obsession over "wars" and "battles", to the point where the "Battle of X" and the "Battle of Y" would end up resulting in the confusion of "battles" from 2 different wars - the "Revolutionary War" and "Civil War", creating a nonsensical mish-mash in a youngster's mind, rendering the historical context meaningless. And this was the case when you live in a state like mine (PA) that had significant historical "battles" cited for both of those wars.

But in any case, Monday will be the 1st anniversary of "Juneteenth" as a federal holiday.