What is Juneteenth?

American History Hit

History Hit

America, History

4.5 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 18 June 2025

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

June 19, 1865 - Galveston, Texas, a general in the Union army announced to the people of Texas that all enslaved African Americans were free. Over time the date has grown from a local to a national holiday, a marker of freedom, of family, and of joy and continued struggle that emerged from this cauldron of the war.

Don's guest today is Mark Anthony Neal, Professor of African & African American Studies at Duke University and host of Left of Black.

Edited by Tim Arstall. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	In the summer of 2005, the eyes of the world turned to London.
0:04.5	The devastating 7-7 bombings would challenge the nation's security, resilience and resolve.
0:10.3	Now, 20 years later, three weeks in July, takes you into the heart of this unprecedented event.
0:16.6	The chaos of the first hours, the frantic manhunt and the high-stakes political drama that followed.
0:22.5	A gripping account revealing the complexity of modern-day counter-terrorism.
0:27.1	Three weeks in July. The new book, Out Now.
0:37.3	Galveston, Texas, June 19, 1866.
0:41.7	A crowd, numbering 1,000 strong, is gathered at the African American Church on Broadway.
0:47.9	Their voices raised together singing John Brown's body lies moldering in the ground.
0:53.9	They've come together one year from the day
0:56.0	when the order declaring emancipation was delivered here in Galveston, here in Texas, and they were
1:01.8	finally able to celebrate freedom from enslavement. At the end of the Civil War a year prior in April
1:07.0	1865, there had been many such celebrations across the country, certainly in the
1:12.5	north. But folks in Texas had been the last to hear, the last concentration of formerly enslaved
1:18.8	people to be informed of the new reality. So now it's a year later, here in Galveston, and these
1:24.7	freed men, women, and children, having moved peacefully throughout the town,
1:28.7	are congregated here at the church in celebration and joy. For decades of struggle still to come,
1:34.8	through Reconstruction's failure, through the agony and violence of Jim Crow, and later the
1:39.4	civil rights movement. This date will remind all Americans of what precious freedom meant to millions of formerly enslaved,
1:47.0	and what it continues to mean to the nation today. This day, the 19th day of June, Juneteenth. It is American History Hit, and I'm your host, Don Wildman, here to welcome you to
2:10.7	Juneteenth, or at least our episode on this important federal holiday in America.
2:15.7	When the nation celebrates the day 160 years ago in June of
	...

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