The Juneteenth Heritage Festival is June 8-19 in the City of Grambling. The week-long celebration commemorates the end of slavery in the South.
The Juneteenth Heritage Festival was formed after a group of people including "felt the need that as an African-American community, we should always remember what our ancestors went through as enslaved Africans," according to Vickie Jackson, Chairman of the Juneteenth Heritage Festival and PR Chairman of the City of Grambling.
The week-long celebration exhibits the talents, beauty, and heritage of African-Americans through events, starting with the Miss Juneteenth Pageant. The festival also takes time to commemorate fallen military and civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., as well as local veterans from any branch of the military.
The Juneteenth Heritage Festival takes place in June because although slaves were freed in January of 1863 with the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation, many slaves in the southern U.S. did not find out about their freedom until two and a half years later. According to Jackson, each time a messenger was sent, they were killed in a "deliberate attempt to keep slavery alive in the South." Juneteenth is a celebration held by African-Americans, especially those in southern states, June 19th to celebrate the end of slavery.
More information and a full schedule of events for the Juneteenth Heritage Festival is available here.