In what is now known as Juneteenth, on June 19, 1865,
Union soldiers arrived in Galveston, Texas with news
that the Civil War was over and slavery in the United
States is abolished.

A mix of June and 19th, Juneteenth has become a day
to commemorate the end of slavery in America. Despite
the fact that President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation
Proclamation was issued more than two years earlier on
January 1, 1863, a lack of Union troops in the rebel state
of Texas made the order difficult to enforce.        
        
       

The holiday is considered the "longest-running African-American holiday"^[ and has been called "America’s second Independence
Day."