{"id":24229,"date":"2022-06-17T14:44:31","date_gmt":"2022-06-17T18:44:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/buffalo-history-museum.local\/?p=24229"},"modified":"2022-06-22T11:34:35","modified_gmt":"2022-06-22T15:34:35","slug":"remembering-buffalos-first-juneteenth-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buffalohistory.org\/remembering-buffalos-first-juneteenth-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering Buffalo’s First Juneteenth Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

Judson Price still remembers the joy he felt when he saw thousands of community members fill Jefferson Avenue for Buffalo\u2019s first Juneteenth Festival in 1976.<\/p>\n

There was \u201centhusiasm galore\u201d and the city had never seen anything like it, Price, 91, said. Block after block of Jefferson featured vendors and entertainment stages filled with jazz, art, street theater, dance, and poetry slams. More than one dozen drill teams, bugle corps, and marching units promenaded down the street in the first Juneteenth Parade.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody came out feeling free and safe and happy and excited. That\u2019s the way it\u2019s been for all these years,\u201d Price said. \u201cWe never had anything like it before, something that we did ourselves that has taken off.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buffalo was one of the first cities in the Northern United States to create a Juneteenth Festival, an event that continues to thrive 46 years later in Martin Luther King, Jr. Park. Earlier this week, five of the remaining members of the first festival\u2019s organizing committee \u2013 Price, the Rev. Eugene Pierce, Gail Wells, Douglas Ruffin, and Roosevelt Wardlaw \u2013 gathered to recall their efforts to create Buffalo\u2019s first Juneteenth Festival, and discuss the celebration\u2019s ongoing legacy.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Five of the remaining members of Buffalo’s first Juneteenth Festival. From left, Judson Price, Douglas Ruffin, Gail Wells, Roosevelt Wardlaw, and the Rev. Eugene Pierce.<\/p><\/div>\n

Scheduling Buffalo\u2019s first Juneteenth a few weeks before the nation\u2019s bicentennial in 1976 was by design. The festival\u2019s first program featured an excerpt from an 1852 speech by orator Frederick Douglass, who criticized the Fourth of July as a day that reminded enslaved people of \u201cthe gross injustice and cruelty to which he was a constant victim.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat to us is July Fourth? What do we have to celebrate?\u201d asked Wells, echoing Douglass\u2019 speech. \u201cWe had nothing to celebrate because we were not free.\u201d<\/p>\n

A coalition of Black leaders and community organizers brought together by the BUILD organization convened to create an alternative event that celebrated the freedom of African Americans. \u00a0The committee members settled on Juneteenth, which was not widely celebrated then, after learning more about its historical significance as the day when Union soldiers set the final enslaved people free in Galveston, Texas, in 1865.<\/p>\n

\"\"

A T-Shirt from the 1998 Juneteenth Festival<\/p><\/div>\n

Wells described the period of Buffalo\u2019s Black history that created Juneteenth as \u201cThe Great Awakening,\u201d an era when Black leaders across the city were implementing visionary solutions to solve problems. Buffalo\u2019s first Juneteenth came at a time when the city\u2019s Black community needed to be uplifted and recognized, according to Ruffin.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a hard time, especially for Black People,\u201d Ruffin said. \u201cYou turned your TV on, you didn\u2019t see them, unless it was for a criminal offense.\u201d<\/p>\n

The committee selected Jefferson Avenue for the first Juneteenth hoping it could serve as a catalyst for the revitalization of that district, which had entered a period of decline by the 1970s. Wells and other committee members cleaned up debris along the streetscape and painted art on vacant storefronts leading up to the celebration. \u201cThis event marks The First Day of a daily fight to revitalize Jefferson Avenue and the surrounding community,\u201d Ruffin wrote in the 1976 festival program\u2019s introduction. \u201cThe present deteriorated condition of our community leaves us deeply disappointed, and there can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. We feel that there is love, and we extend that hope to you through our Juneteenth Festival.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"

The program cover for the 1976 Buffalo Juneteenth Festival.<\/p><\/div>\n

That fight continues nearly a half-century later, Pierce said. This year\u2019s festival takes place only one month after an alleged white supremacist killed 10 people at the Jefferson Avenue Tops, which was targeted because he knew the customer base was predominantly Black. The worst mass shooting in the city\u2019s history proves \u201cwe still have more work to do,\u201d Pierce said.<\/p>\n

Yet the spirit of the first Juneteenth that brought the city together in 1976 \u2013 of hope, of healing, and of understanding \u2013lives on in the city in 2022, said Price, who believes the festival can still serve as a catalyst for the revitalization of the city\u2019s East Side. For Wells and other committee members, Juneteenth provides a window into history that\u2019s necessary for moving forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t create a future if you don\u2019t know what they had in the past,\u201d Wells said. \u201cOur strength is standing on the shoulders of our ancestors. You cannot forget who paved the way. You can not forget.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Judson Price still remembers the joy he felt when he saw thousands of community members fill Jefferson Avenue for Buffalo\u2019s first Juneteenth Festival in 1976. There was \u201centhusiasm galore\u201d and… Continue Reading Remembering Buffalo’s First Juneteenth Festival<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":24230,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nRemembering Buffalo's First Juneteenth Festival - The Buffalo History Museum<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/buffalohistory.org\/remembering-buffalos-first-juneteenth-festival\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Remembering Buffalo's First Juneteenth Festival - The Buffalo History Museum\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Judson Price still remembers the joy he felt when he saw thousands of community members fill Jefferson Avenue for Buffalo\u2019s first Juneteenth Festival in 1976. 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