Natick Common Hosts Juneteenth Celebration

NATICK, MA — The Natick Center Cultural District is hosting three events on Monday to honor Juneteenth.

The Monday, June 19, national holiday commemorates the day in 1865, more than two years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, when word finally reached the last enslaved people in Texas that the Civil War had ended, and they were free.

Also known as Emancipation Day, Freedom Day and Jubilee Day, Juneteenth is the oldest-known celebration of the end of slavery in the United States. In 2021, President Joe Biden signed legislation making it a federal holiday, the first since the addition of Martin Luther King Jr. Day in 1983.

Events in Natick start at 10 a.m. on the steps of the Morse Institute Library, when the Natick Historical Society and Natick for Black Lives Matter will host a reading of Frederick Douglass’s “What to a Slave is the 4th of July”.

Then, the cultural district will host a Juneteenth celebration on the Natick Common from 1 to 4 p.m. The event features a number of speakers with performances by The Drum Nomads, Crocodile River Music, Slow Boat, and Squeezebox Stompers.

Finally, at 6:30 p.m., a screening of "Black N Black" by local director Zadi Zokou will be shown at the Common Street Spiritual Center.