By Mary-Justine Lanyon
President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863, declaring “that all persons held as slaves” within the rebellious states (during the Civil War) “are and henceforward shall be free.”
But it wasn’t until June 19, 1865, that freedom finally came for the 250,000 enslaved people of Texas. On that day – which came to be known as Juneteenth – the Army arrived to enforce what had already been the law of the land for two-and-a-half years.
Jo Bonita Rains – who was born in Memphis – brought the message of Juneteenth to the Women’s Club of Lake Arrowhead at their meeting, appropriately held on June 19.
“Can you imagine the language shared by the slave owners and the slaves?” she asked. “Some slaves asked, how can we not be slaves? The owners wondered who was going to do all the work.
“You might imagine,” Rains said, “that they went to each other and said, now we’re brothers and sisters – that didn’t happen.
“I’m making light of this,” Rains said, “because this is not Black history. It’s American history. It’s our collective history, a history that says everything is in transition. We have learned over the years that we have different ethnicities and cultural backgrounds.”
As for her own background, Rains shared that her mother, one of nine children, was from a family of sharecroppers. “They worked for the master. He told them their starting and ending hours. And he had relations with some of the younger ones so we have a variety of shades.”
Following the Emancipation Proclamation, slave owners said they were not going to pay the freed slaves. They said they had never paid them before. But the law said they had to pay them – they were their employees. “That began another level of conflict,” Rains said.
“Because I’m African-American,” she noted, “I’m proud of my heritage. My sense of pride in who I am started in Memphis. My Dad would take me shopping. One day I needed to use the bathroom and saw a woman walk out of a restroom. I told my Dad I was going in. He grabbed my long hair and told me to read the sign. It said ‘White.’ He told me I couldn’t go in there. I could go in the one that said ‘Colored.’ The aroma coming out of there was horrific.
“You can’t go in there, he told me, but you are responsible for making that change. I was 4 years old.”
On Juneteenth the military told the Texas slaves they were free, Rains noted, but not how they would eat, how they would pay their bills, what opportunities they would have. “They said, you’re free – go for it.”
There are so many ways we can help other feel comfortable, she said. “I came up here from Pasadena. People came to me and said, let me buy you a glass of wine. And then they asked, what did you do that made that vet want to marry you? I could have said a variety of things but what I did say was, don’t you wish you knew.” To that, the Women’s Club members burst into applause.
“Today’s celebration is for all of us. It’s a holiday for all of us, not a holiday to throw a party but to acknowledge. Everywhere we have gotten takes determination and people who care.
“My heart and soul reflect what Juneteenth is about.”
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