WOW! Summer Special

On June 17, 2021, President Biden signed a bill into law establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday.

The freedom promised in the Emancipation Proclamation was finally delivered to 250,000 people who remained enslaved in Texas two and a half years after President Lincoln’s historic proclamation. On June 19, 1865, US Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger issued General Order 3, which informed the people of Texas that all enslaved persons in the state were now free. This day has come to be known as Juneteenth, a combination of June and 19th. It is also called Freedom Day or Emancipation Day, and it is the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.