Juneteenth

This book tells how the author & her family celebrated in 1945 the 80th Juneteenth, the holiday that celebrates the emancipation of African Americans from slavery.

Juneteenth Texas reflects the many dimensions of African-American folklore. The personal essays are reminiscences about the past and are written from both black and white perspectives. They are followed by essays which classify and describe different aspects of African-American folk culture in Texas; studies of specific genres of folklore, such as songs and stories; studies of specific performers, such as Lightnin' Hopkins and Manse Lipscomb and of particular folklorists. Link to the book, then scroll down to Online Access to view it.

This is the first full-length biography of the Civil War general who saved the Union army from catastrophic defeat at the Battle of Chickamauga, and went on to play major roles in the Chattanooga and Mobile campaigns. Immediately after the war, as commander of U.S. troops in Texas, his actions sparked the "Juneteenth" celebrations of slavery's end, which continue to this day.

Shot on the Senate floor by a young Black man, a dying racist senator summons an elderly Black Baptist minister from Oklahoma to his side for a remarkable dialogue that reveals the deeply buried secrets of their shared past and the tragedy that reunites them.

Daniel Crofts examines a little-known episode in the most celebrated aspect of Abraham Lincoln's life: his role as the "Great Emancipator." In 1861, as part of a last-ditch effort to preserve the Union and prevent war, the new president offered to accept a constitutional amendment that barred Congress from interfering with slavery in the slave states. Crofts unearths the hidden history and political maneuvering behind the stillborn attempt to enact this amendment, the polar opposite of the actual Thirteenth Amendment of 1865 that ended slavery.

Some celebrate Lincoln for freeing the slaves; others fault him for a long-standing conservatism on abolition and race. James Oakes gives us another option in this brilliant exploration of Lincoln and the end of slavery.

Emancipation was not merely a product of Lincoln's proclamation or of Confederate defeat in April 1865. It was a process that required more than legal or military action. Emancipation necessitated a fundamental reordering of a way of life whose implications stretched well beyond the former slave states.