Triad Cultural Arts, Inc. is proud to sponsor Juneteenth, a celebration of the country’s longest-running observance of the abolition of slavery. It commemorates the day when those enslaved in Galveston, Texas, the last geographic area in America where slavery existed, learned of their freedom on June 19, 1865. Union General Granger read General Order #3, that “all slaves are free.” 

Slavery ended about a month earlier in North Carolina when Rev. S.G. Clark, a Union Calvary Chaplain, came into the African Moravian church in Salem (now Winston-Salem) on Sunday, May 21, 1865 and read General Orders #32 that proclaimed that “all persons held as slaves are free.”

As Texans of African American descent have migrated across the United States and settled elsewhere, they have taken the observance of Juneteenth with them. More and more descendants of slaves in other states are joining in the celebration and seeking in some instances to make the holiday a legal one in their respective states.

The Juneteenth Celebration in Winston-Salem can be traced back to 1998 when Mrs. Pat Stepney, founder of the NC Association of Black Storytellers, attended a Juneteenth celebration in Greensboro.  She organized a local Juneteenth celebration with Cheryl Harry who was employed at the Winston Lake Family YMCA and the YMCA began sponsoring a city-wide event under their direction.  Jerrilyn Johnson who had been sponsoring celebrations at the Mt. Pleasant Baptist Church combined their efforts with the YMCA. The city-wide celebration dropped off in the early 2000s.  In 2005, the Triad Juneteenth Committee was formed, (which would later become Triad Cultural Arts in 2007) and sparked new interest in the celebration partnering with Representative Larry Womble, the City of Winston-Salem’s Human Relations Department, Recreation and Parks Department, Union Baptist Church and Food Lion, Inc.  The celebration included a round-table discussion at City Hall with Dr. Maya Angelou and local leaders and a festival at Corpening Plaza.  The festival has been held at various locations in the city including Rupert Bell Park, Winston Lake Park, Coliseum Annex and on the 5th Street and ML King, Jr. Drive and Innovation Quarter.

In 2006 the Synod of the Moravian Church, Southern Province, passed a resolution apologizing for the Moravian Church’s participation in slavery. In April 2007 the North Carolina Senate apologized for the Legislature’s role in promoting slavery and Jim Crow laws that denied basic human rights to the state’s black citizens and in August 2007 the Governor of North Carolina signed a bill sponsored by Rep Larry Womble and Rep Jones into law which recognized Juneteenth as National Freedom Day.

Join us as we celebrate and recognize those African Americans who survived the inhumane and cruel institution of slavery. It is also on this day we pay homage to the ancestors who kept safe our language, songs and customs!

By connecting the present to the past, Juneteenth is a “homecoming” for all African Americans, helping to define their place within the African Diaspora.

(This history is always being updated.  If you have additional knowledge, please email: triadculture9@gmail.com)

STATEMENT IN SUPPORT OF JUNE 19 “JUNETEENTH” AS AN OFFICIAL CITY OF WINSTON-SALEM HOLIDAY

On January 1, 1863, President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation declared that all slaves within any confederate state or designated part of a confederate state shall be freed. His proclamation did not free enslaved persons within Union states, states that did not join the confederacy, or Union occupied areas of Louisiana and Tennessee. This moral compromise was tragic for African Americans across the nation.

It was more than two years, that on June 19, 1865, in Galveston, Texas, President Lincoln’s proclamation would end what remained of slavery in the United States. In 1866, one year later Juneteenth was a formalized celebration which not only served to celebrate freedom but as a way to gather lost family members, to give voting instructions to newly freedmen and to assess progress that had been made.

Today, Juneteenth is widely recognized and celebrated nationwide in 47 states and the District of Columbia. It symbolizes a time for our community to remember the history of African Americans in this nation, to teach the next generation of its cultural significance, and celebrate our freedom. Local celebrations in Winston-Salem started as early as 1999 and have been observed annually in our community in some form since that time.

We fully acknowledge that the enactment of a Juneteenth holiday cannot repair the breach with Black Americans and we call for reparations be considered along with the institution of the Juneteenth holiday. Our City’s recognition of Juneteenth as an official holiday will not only be a step towards reconciling the systematic racism that stems from our nation’s greatest sin – slavery, but a catalyst to address the disparities in education, housing, employment, healthcare, policing, disproportionate incarceration and inequities in our system.

At its July 21 meeting, the Greensboro City Council unanimously approved Juneteenth as a paid holiday for City employees beginning in 2021, joining other North Carolina cities. The State of Massachusetts; Austin, Texas; Augusta, Georgia; and universities and municipalities across the nation have approved Juneteenth Independence Day as an official, paid holiday.

Our City should move forward in these efforts to approve Juneteenth as an official paid holiday for city employees and day of observance.

The recognition celebrates the core values of our nation, liberty and freedom.