Effective this year Juneteenth Independence Day (June 19) is officially a holiday. Juneteenth Independence Day is in recognition of June 19, 1865, the date on which slavery legally came to an end in the United States. This year Juneteenth Independence Day is on a Saturday and will be observed on Friday, June 18, 2021.

The day, which is also known as Emancipation Day, recalls June 19, 1865, when Gordon Granger, a Union general, arrived in Galveston, Texas, to inform enslaved African-Americans that the Civil War had ended and that they had been freed under the Emancipation Proclamation, which had been signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863. The proclamation ended slavery only in states that had seceded; an end to slavery in the entire country waited until December 1865, when the 13th Amendment was adopted into the Constitution.

The Memorial Library will be closed on Friday, June 18, and Saturday, June 19. Library services will resume at 2 p.m. on Sunday, June 20.

Emergency Services will continue to operate as usual.