Staff Picks - LibGuides at Boulder Public Library

For the first time on Saturday June 19th 2021, our country formally observed Juneteenth, the newest federal holiday that celebrates the Emancipation of enslaved Americans. I wanted to know more about Juneteenth, and this short book by Gordon-Reed was a perfect education. Enslaved people in Galveston, Texas (Texas is the author's home state) didn't learn that they had been freed two years earlier until June 19, 1865. She tells the story of Black people's history in Texas and the state's history with them, including how Juneteenth has long been a big festival there. She also interweaves, to strong effect, stories of her own childhood (including how she integrated her school) and her family's history. Well-written and succinct and full of good stories, this book will get you ready for next year's Juneteenth celebrations--and will make you eager to learn more about Black history in general.

Publisher description:

Interweaving American history, dramatic family chronicle, and searing episodes of memoir, Annette Gordon-Reed, the descendant of enslaved people brought to Texas in the, recounts the origins of Juneteenth and explores the legacies of the holiday that remain with us. From the earliest presence of black people in Texas-in the 1500s, well before enslaved Africans arrived in Jamestown-to the day in Galveston on June 19, 1865, when General Gordon Granger announced the end of slavery, Gordon-Reed's insightful and inspiring essays present the saga of a "frontier" peopled by Native Americans, Anglos, Tejanos, and Blacks that became a slaveholder's republic. Reworking the "Alamo" framework, Gordon-Reed shows that the slave-and race-based economy not only defined this fractious era of Texas independence, but precipitated the Mexican-American War and the resulting Civil War. A commemoration of Juneteenth and the fraught legacies of slavery that still persist, On Juneteenth is stark reminder that the fight for equality is ongoing.

Find On Juneteenth in our online catalog

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