The City of Rio Rancho is excited to host Rio Rancho’s Juneteenth Freedom Day celebration on Friday, June 16 from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Campus Park at City Center.
This event is free to the public and will feature food, activities, and a beer garden. There will also be vendor booths and community services booths on hand for event attendees to purchase goods and receive information about healthcare and other community/social services.
After the event, there will be a showing of the movie 42 starring Chadwick Boseman, as Jackie Robinson, and Harrison Ford.
Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when Major General Gordon Granger issued General’s Orders Number 3 in Galveston, Texas to ensure that all enslaved people would be freed. Despite the Emancipation Proclamation being signed two and a half years earlier, Black people were still being held as slaves in Texas. Following the Civil War, the Union Army was sent to ensure that all people, in every state, would be free. Communities throughout the United States have continued to celebrate Juneteenth. Texas became the first state to name Juneteenth as an official holiday in 1979 and on June 17, 2021, Juneteenth National Independence Day was made a federal holiday.