What is Juneteenth celebrating?

Although Juneteenth generally celebrates the end of slavery in the United States, it was still legal and practiced in two Union border states (Delaware and Kentucky) until later that year when ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution abolished chattel slavery nationwide in December.

The arrival of the first captives to the Jamestown Colony, in 1619, is often seen as the beginning of slavery in America—but enslaved Africans arrived in North America as early as the 1500s./span>

The most active European nation in the trans-Atlantic slave trade was Portugal, which used the forced labor of Africans in their Latin American colonies in present-day Brazil. Almost 3.

The historian Marcel Trudel catalogued the existence of about 4,200 slaves in Canada between 1671 and 1834, the year slavery was abolished in the British Empire. About two-thirds of these were Native and one-third were Blacks. The use of slaves varied a great deal throughout the course of this period.

Juneteenth, an annual holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States, has been celebrated by African-Americans since the late 1800s./span>

Texas was the last frontier of chattel slavery in the United States. In the fewer than fifty years between 1821 and 1865, the “Peculiar Institution,” as Southerners called it, spread over the eastern two-fifths of the state, an area nearly as large as Alabama and Mississippi combined.

The National Juneteenth Observance Foundation (NJOF), founded in 1994, recognizes the same colors found in the U.S. flag: red, white, and blue, showing that the formerly enslaved were and are Americans./span>

The Juneteenth flag is full of symbols. The flag is the brainchild of activist Ben Haith, founder of the National Juneteenth Celebration Foundation (NJCF). Haith created the flag in 1997 with the help of collaborators, and Boston-based illustrator Lisa Jeanne Graf brought their vision to life./span>

NEW ORLEANS – The fleur-de-lis is a symbol that is deeply ingrained in Louisiana’s history. Seen in architecture, the state flag and on the helmets of the Saints, it’s everywhere. But while it is now seen as the mark of the state, it was once used to mark slaves./span>

The Statue of Liberty

So popular were these symbols, the 1776 design for the Great Seal of the United States portrayed the goddess of liberty holding a liberty pole with a cap. They also appeared on U.S. coins for almost a hundred years….Learn More.

Some of the icons discussed include: the American Flag, the Pledge of Allegiance, the Great Seal of the United States, and the origins of “The Star Spangled Banner.” Students also learn the story of the Statue of Liberty and the importance of Independence Hall in Philadelphia in establishing the country.

The Statue of Liberty