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You are cordially invited for this year’s Juneteenth commemoration at Vale Cemetery’s African American Ancestral Burial Ground (Section F). The free event commences at 3pm onFriday, June 19 th with music, oratory, history and ice cream social followed by a bring your own picnic and a chance to tour this culturally significant plot lasting until 6pm.
This occasion kicks off a weekend of celebration which continues Saturday, June 20th in Central Park with a day of entertainment, workshops, and parade beginning at 1pm by the Hamilton Hill Arts Center.
Juneteenth is the oldest known celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the United States. On June 19, 1865, Union soldiers led by Major General Gordon Granger landed at Galveston, Texas with news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free. This was two and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation had become official (January 1, 1863). It had little impact on the Texans
due to a lack of Union troops available to enforce the new Executive order. With the surrender of General Lee in April 1865, and the arrival of General Granger’s regiment, the forces were strong enough to overcome the resistance.
The African American Ancestral Burial Ground contains the graves of several notables including Moses Viney, who escaped enslavement and became a well-loved Union College employee, Corporal Jared Jackson who served with company N of the 20 th Regiment of U.S. Colored Troops in the Civil War, Bartlett Jackson who was hired by Captain Joslin of the 134 th N.Y. Regiment to tend his horses,, and Walter Simpkins the founder of Community Fathers an organization aimed at educating children in the Black Community about Black History, literature, music, archeology, science and reverence for their ancestors’ struggles for freedom and equality.
This plot of land is listed on the U.S. Park Service Underground Network to Freedom and was recently added to the Black Cemetery Network’s national directory.
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Event Venue
907 State St, Schenectady, NY, United States, New York 12307
Tickets
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups - all the happenings, one place.
