All the Juneteenth Events in Metro Denver

Five Points celebrated June 19 long before it became an official holiday.

June 18, 2024

Image: drawing of Juneteenth celebrations

Denver has been celebrating Juneteenth for seventy years. Marcus Murray

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Decades before Juneteenth was declared a federal holiday in 2021, there were celebrations in Five Points. June 19 was the day in 1865 when federal troops reached Galveston, Texas, telling the enslaved people of the area that they were free...more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation.

The event was later dubbed Juneteenth, and was celebrated unofficially for more than a century before it became an actual holiday. The Juneteenth celebration in Five Points dates back to the ’50s (see our Juneteenth history here). On June 17, 2021, President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act, making June 19 the first federal holiday added to the country's lineup since President Ronald Reagan named Martin Luther King Jr. Day a holiday in 1983.

While many of the metro area's Juneteenth events are focused on the Five Points neighborhood, including last weekend's Juneteenth Music Festival, there are still other holiday celebrations across Colorado this week.

For more, keep reading...

click to enlarge

Celebrants at Juneteenth in Five Points in 2021, the year it became a federal holiday.

Ken Hamblin III

Five Points Neighborhood Block Party and Artfest
Saturday, June 22, 3 to 6 p.m.
Spangalang Brewery, 2736 Welton Street
Denver Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation will present the Art of Neighborhood Organizing, a program designed to foster community connections and provide insight into effective neighborhood organizing strategies. It starts out with Neighborhood Organizing 101 Lab at nuRoot Studios at 2942 Welton Street; while that event is limited to forty people, the block party that follows will be a boundless bash merging the craft beer world with modern urban culture in Historic Five Points. Admission is free; learn more at denverinc.org.

Longmont Juneteenth Family Celebration
Saturday, June 22, 1 to 6 p.m.
Roosevelt Park, Longmont
Grammy Award-winning R&B singer Chrisette Michele leads the entertainment at this free celebration that caps off the Juneteenth Celebration Festival. Get free tickets and more information for all of these Boulder County events here.

Juneteenth Celebration
Saturday, June 22, 5:30 to 9 p.m.
Coal Creek Park, 575 Kattell Street, Erie
This celebration will include family-friendly activities, food trucks, music and other entertainment, including the Hot Lunch Band. Admission is free; learn more here.

What did we miss? Send information to [email protected]. And learn more about our cover artist, Marcus Murray, here.

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