2025 JUNETEENTH DOUGLASS FREEDOM PARADE
Juneteenth Douglass will host the 2025 JUNETEENTH FREEDOM PARADE at 11 AM on June 21 in the historic Douglass community!
So let me give y'all a bit of history...
"A Jubilee of Freedom”: Freed Slaves March in Charleston, South Carolina, March, 1865
At the Civil War’s end, enslaved people responded in a variety of ways to take their freedom. One meaning of freedom can be glimpsed in the following report from Charleston, South Carolina, published in the New York Daily Tribune on April 4, 1865, just a few days before General Robert E. Lee’s surrender in Virginia. Charleston boasted one of the largest and most important African-American communities in the antebellum South. Two months after the Confederate Army fled, the city’s black men and women organized a parade to celebrate their emancipation. The parade numbered thousands of marchers and included dramatic tableaux, banners, and songs. African Americans used such public celebrations to symbolize their deeply held beliefs and feelings, in a manner that paralleled the public displays of their white working-class counterparts in the decades before the war.
Source: Charleston, March 27, 1865." New-York Daily Tribune, Tuesday, April 4, 1865
While "they" are trying to roll back the rights of women, immigrants, children, all black and brown people, WE WILL STAND & MARCH FOR OUR FREEDOM!
JOIN US! Enter your float, car, dance teams. bands, majorettes, block clubs, community, street, family... ERRBADY & REPRESENT!
2025 JUNETEENTH FREEDOM PARADE QUEEN
It is our honor to introduce our esteemed city councilperson, Dr. Michalyn Easter-Thomas as the 2025 Juneteenth Freedom Parade Queen!
Dr. Easter-Thomas, affectionately known as MET7 has been a friend and supporter of Juneteenth Douglass for more than a decade, even before she became our District 7 City Council Representative!
MET7 lives, works, and plays in District 7 and has been a driving force for resources that support the Juneteenth Douglass festival, the Douglass community, and all communities in District 7!
In her final term as our council representative MET7 has launched the North Memphis Community Food Plan that imagines and supports food equity and sustainability in North Memphis. She has also been an avid supporter of all programming in Douglass Community Center providing resources and support for the community center spring and summer camps, back to school events, inclement weather events, Christmas and Easter programs, the Senior Shower of Love that supports D7 elders and seniors, and so much more!
The 32nd Annual Juneteenth Douglass Freedom Festival & Parade honors this powerful woman of color who continues to move the movement and our communities towards equity, equality, sustainability, and access!
Thank you Councilwoman Michalyn Easter-Thomas for being a fierce supporter and defender of the Douglass community, Juneteenth Douglass, and all of District 7!
PARADE SCHEDULE
LINEUP begins at 10 AM at the corner of Calvert St. & Warford St., 38108
PARADE begins at 11 AM
ROUTE starts going South from Warford St. to Chelsea Ave. > left onto Chelsea Ave. > Chelsea Ave. to Locust St., and make a left onto Locust St. > Locust St to Mt. Olive Rd., and make a right onto Mt. Olive Rd. > Mt. Olive Rd. to Douglass Park
Aaaaand when the parade ends, the BBQ SMOKE-OFF begins!