Barbea Williams Performing Company, Inc. is hosting Tucson's 50th Juneteenth Celebration through Facebook Live.
50th Juneteenth Celebration 6-20-2020, 8:30am until Posted by Barbea Williams Performing Company, Inc. on Saturday, June 20, 2020
Due to the spike in coronavirus cases in Arizona, Saturday evening's event at Silverlake Park has been canceled.
Related: Black Lives Matter banner displayed across Tucson's City Hall.
Juneteenth, short for June 19, commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. President Abraham Lincoln first issued the Emancipation Proclamation on Sept. 22, 1862, and it became effective the following Jan. 1. But it wasn’t enforced in many places until after the Civil War ended in April 1865. Word didn’t reach the last enslaved Black people until June 19 of that year, when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to Galveston, Texas.
