Come join us for our very first virtual 5K. In celebration of Juneteenth, Natasha’s Closet will host a run, walk, and bike event for the entire month of June. We want you to move at your own pace. if you cannot complete the 5K in June, that does not mean the race is over. You will have the entire year of 2022 to complete the race. Let’s celebrate the month African Americans were set free from some areas of bondage and oppression.

“Juneteenth (short for “June Nineteenth”) marks the day when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas in 1865 to take control of the state and ensure that all enslaved people be freed. The troops’ arrival came a full two and a half years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. Juneteenth honors the end to slavery in the United States and is considered the longest-running African American holiday. On June 17, 2021, it officially became a federal holiday” (Nix, 2021).

“Confederate General Robert E. Lee had surrendered at Appomattox Court House two months earlier in Virginia, but slavery had remained relatively unaffected in Texas—until U.S. General Gordon Granger stood on Texas soil and read General Orders No. 3: “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free” (Nix, 2021).

“The year following 1865, freedmen in Texas organized the first of what became the annual celebration of "Jubilee Day" on June 19. In the ensuing decades, Juneteenth commemorations featured music, barbecues, prayer services and other activities, and as Black people migrated from Texas to other parts of the country the Juneteenth tradition spread” (Nix, 2021).

“In 1979, Texas became the first state to make Juneteenth an official holiday; several others followed suit over the years. In June 2021, Congress passed a resolution establishing Juneteenth as a national holiday; President Biden signed it into law on June 17, 2021” (Nix, 2021).

Come Juneteenth with me.

XOXO

Jyevonne Shanta