“If you don’t know where you came from, then you don’t know where you’re going.”
Juneteenth, the East Side festival that coincides with the Allentown Art Festival, is an exploration of black history and culture. Juneteenth is also known as Emancipation Day, so you can imagine just how important the event is, when celebrated each and every year at Martin Luther King Jr. Park.
The free festival features a parade, multiple performance stages, Underground Railroad tours, children’s activities, African dance and drum lessons, a basketball showcase, and a wide array of culturally significant activities and events.
If you’ve never visited the Juneteenth festival, and you want to learn more about it, there’s an awesome video that you must watch that recounts the history of the event, and what it stands for (see below). 2015 marks a very special year for Juneteenth. While Buffalo has been observing the holiday for 40 years, it has been 150 years since the announcement of the abolition of slavery in the US.
Juneteenth | Saturday & Sunday, June 13 & 14 | Noon-8:00pm | Martin Luther King, Jr Park