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Fairfax City marked Juneteenth with a celebration of Black history, resilience and community on June 14, filling Old Town Square with live entertainment, food and craft vendors, children’s activities and a ceremony focused on the continuing pursuit of racial justice.

Mayor Catherine Read welcomed attendees to the city’s third annual observance, describing it as an opportunity to recognize the contributions of Black ancestors and present-day community members.

Read introduced Councilmembers Anthony Amos, Billy Bates, Stacy Hall and Stacey Hardy-Chandler before remembering U.S. Rep. Gerry Connolly, who died in May. She said Connolly cared deeply about his constituents, regularly attended community events and spoke about issues important to the region and nation.

His absence, Read said, made it even more important to discuss the Black community’s history and its relevance to Fairfax. She encouraged the crowd to enjoy the celebration as a jubilee.

Emcee Philip Wilkerson, a George Mason University staff member and doctoral student, read prepared remarks from state Sen. Saddam Salim, who was unable to attend.

Salim’s message placed the celebration amid what he described as renewed threats to social justice, free speech and due process. Although divisions can make earlier progress appear uncertain, he wrote, Juneteenth demonstrates that people still have the power to shape the country’s future.

He called on Virginians to renew their commitment to equality under the law and to a more inclusive, democratic and peaceful society. Continuing the struggle for justice, he wrote, honors those who fought for freedom before them.

Del. David Bulova reflected on the contradictions in Virginia’s history. Enslavement took hold at Point Comfort in 1619, he said, while the state later entrenched Jim Crow in its 1902 Constitution and helped lead Massive Resistance, closing schools rather than integrating them.

Virginia has also produced important advances, Bulova noted. Richmond attorney Oliver Hill played a pivotal role in the legal fight that led to the Brown v. Board of Education ruling against school segregation. In 1989, voters elected Doug Wilder as the nation’s first Black governor, and 32 current General Assembly members belong to the Legislative Black Caucus.

Bulova said the June 1865 emancipation commemorated by Juneteenth helped make those achievements possible, along with the determination and sacrifice of people who used freedom as a foundation for further change.

He urged residents to visit Alexandria’s Freedom House Museum and learn the story of Henry Bailey. Sold into slavery as a child and separated from his family, Bailey was sent to Texas. Emancipated at 21, he walked more than 1,000 miles back to Alexandria and reunited with his mother.

Bailey later served as minister of Ebenezer Baptist Church, established two schools and founded what is now Greater Little Zion Baptist Church on Zion Drive, just south of Fairfax City.

His daughter, Annie Rose, carried that legacy forward by helping organize the March on Washington and contributing to the creation of the Alexandria Society for the Preservation of Black Heritage. In the 1980s, the building where Bailey had once stood as a frightened child was named Freedom House in recognition of his emancipation.

Bulova said Juneteenth celebrates emancipation, family and the strength, courage and contributions of Black Americans. Despite generations of setbacks and heartbreak, he said, the holiday also recognizes the journey toward freedom and justice that began 160 years ago.

The Rev. Nelson Sneed of the Northern Virginia Baptist Association delivered the invocation, honoring those who courageously demanded that the country confront racial injustice. He prayed for diversity to flourish with dignity and respect.

Wilkerson then recounted Juneteenth’s origins. On June 19, 1865—about two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation—Union troops reached Galveston, Texas, and announced that enslaved people were free.

He described Juneteenth as a reminder of delayed justice and of the resilience of people who refused to be erased. Emancipation did not eliminate systemic injustice, generational trauma or inequality, he said, but it also did not diminish the Black community’s creativity, perseverance and strength.

Speaking personally, Wilkerson said he feels connected to his ancestors and carries their resilience with him. He shares their history with his sons so they understand not only where they came from, but also their own power. He encouraged the audience to make Juneteenth a starting point for conversations and stronger connections across generations.

Fairfax resident Krysta Jones examined the history of Black labor, noting that the United States was built through the work of Black people. After slavery, she said, sharecropping offered a means of earning a living while often trapping workers in debt and keeping them under landowners’ control. Many eventually left the South in search of greater opportunity, though Black workers continue to encounter inequity.

Jones described Juneteenth as a symbol of the shift from forced labor to free labor. She said Black Americans continue strengthening the country by building communities, advocating for causes, mentoring others and helping people in need. Jones also pointed to her own work writing children’s books as a way to pass along a legacy of self-directed work.

She urged attendees to see the holiday as both a commemoration and a call for continued action toward economic justice and equality.

Sneed closed the ceremony by emphasizing that a diverse nation is stronger when its people stand together. In his benediction, he acknowledged the country’s political discord and prayed for Americans to reject hatred, white supremacy and white nationalism in favor of unity among people of many backgrounds.