On a hot Thursday afternoon, Black Kansas City residents gathered at a park in Midtown to celebrate Juneteenth, the holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the U.S., and remember why the fight for liberation continues.
The Juneteenth cookout was hosted by the Kansas City Defender and Decarcerate KC at Harris Park along 40th Street and Wayne Avenue. The event drew residents young and old to enjoy free food, horseback rides, games, a yoga session, music and a basketball tournament.
Juneteenth celebrates when enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned of the Emancipation Proclamation on June 19, 1865, more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln signed it…