This Friday, June 19th, marks the United States’ newest federal holiday, commemorating Juneteenth National Independence Day. Juneteenth, however, has a long history of being celebrated in Bossier Parish, even if the occasion may have carried a different name. In the 19th century to mid-20th century, these celebrations were typically referred to as Emancipation Day, or occasionally as Jubilee Day, Freedom Day or Liberation Day.
Juneteenth recognizes the day in 1865 when the enslaved men & women in Galveston, Texas learned that they were free two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation, and federal troops were sent to enforce the proclamation. Thus, historically Juneteenth has often been considered a “Texas holiday,” but newspaper articles going back to the late 19th century show how African American residents of Bossier Parish celebrated both within the parish or took advantage of special Juneteenth holiday railroad tickets to join celebrations in places such as Boyce, LA or Stamps, AR.
The “Shreveport Times” on Tuesday, June 29, 1917, announced,
“While the negro population of Shreveport is celebrating Emancipation Day, they will not have anything on the ‘country,’ for the farm hands and negro farmers of the parish are, in their own way, to have as big a celebration as their neighbors in the city. Picnics, dances barbecues, speech-making and other means of observing the day have been arranged for on an elaborate scale.”
The biggest of all of these “country” celebrations, the Times noted, was to be in Bossier Parish on the Liberia Plantation. Mrs. Olive Foster, the owner of the planation, had “taken charge of arrangements” for the celebration on the large Bossier plantation (1400 acres in Ward 2 of Bossier Parish. Numerous present-day subdivisions have been carved out of it in Bossier City and the Red Chute area of Haughton) and the Times guaranteed it to be “the biggest party yet” for the attendees.
The festivities were to start at 4:00 PM with a baseball game between the Liberia team and a team from adjoining plantations. Mrs. Foster supplied uniforms and equipment for both teams. Following the game, several of the Liberia workers were to present a vaudeville-style program. Two-thirds of the money taken for tickets to both the game and the show would be donated to the local Red Cross. There would be a dance following the show and refreshments would be served all day to “keep down summer temperatures.” The grove on the plantation was expected to also lend lots of cool shade. The Times reported that in addition to the African Americans “for miles around” who were expected to attend, it was anticipated that many local white residents would visit Liberia Plantation on Juneteenth, especially the ball game, as spectators.
The “Bossier Banner-Progress” newspaper wrote that about five or six hundred celebrants gathered at Princeton, near Haughton, for a big barbecue and baseball games. In 1924, the “Bossier Banner” wrote of a large Emancipation Day party held in the Seven Pines community, which is several miles northeast of Benton, that featured barbecued meats, music, and dancing. In 1934, the “Plain Dealing Progress” reported that no less than five hundred people attended an Emancipation Day gathering to participate in ball games, dances and other celebrations.
In an oral history interview, Rev. Carl Hawkins, who grew up in Bossier Parish in the 1930s & 40s, notes that, "We would have picnics and barbecue; most of the churches would have some type of activities going on." Bessie Rhodes, in her oral history, remembers baseball games on Juneteenth in the 1930s. "The 19th of June was our celebration and I loved the ball games. We’d have a big old thing!" John Williams considered the meal served on June 19th, when he was growing up in Koran, as his family’s equivalent of a Thanksgiving feast.
Waylin Nattin, who lived in the Alden Bridge logging and sawmill community in north Bossier Parish, pointed out a less-celebratory aspect of the holiday in the first half of the 20th century, when all facets of local life, including “independence days,” were segregated by race. Alden Bridge, a logging company town between Benton and Plain Dealing, was known in the region for its Fourth of July dances, barbeques and other festivities to celebrate American independence. These festivities were for Alden Bridge’s white residents and workers only. Black workers got their independence holiday on Juneteenth, when the lumber company made the ballfields and barbecue pits available to black workers and community members.
The Bossier Parish Libraries History Center in the Bossier Central Library complex is still closed while our new exhibits are installed. Don’t forget you can explore many of our collections, including listen to the digitized oral history interviews such as the oral histories with the Juneteenth stories referred in this article, on our website, www.bossierlibrary.org. Look for the History and Genealogy page under Resources and then choose Collections Database. Feel free to contact History Center staff by phone or email for assistance. Our phone number is (318) 746-7717 and our email is history-center@bossierlibrary.org. Don’t forget, all Bossier Parish Libraries will be closed Friday, June 19 for the holiday.
Images:
- Juneteenth special train ticket rates, The Shreveport Journal Mon, Jun 18, 1917
- T. Olive Foster from The Tennessean, Feb. 5th, 1899
- Unidentified baseball player in Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La. C. 1930. Photo courtesy of Mrs. Leona Raymond
- Whited & Wheless, Ltd. (Lumber Company) Alden Bridge, La.
No comments:
Post a Comment