At Juneteenth celebration in Allensworth, many see an unfinished story

ALLENSWORTH, Calif. — Allensworth — and the Allensworth State Historic Park — is located on a small stretch of the rural San Joaquin Valley that is easy to miss. There’s no train station there. But on a recent day, the train made a special stop for hundreds gathering to celebrate freedom.

Andre Adams was on board with his son – who was going to a Juneteenth event for the first time. The Juneteenth holiday marks the end of slavery in 1865 in the United States

“I wanted him to take part in this and enjoy the experience,” Adams, who is from Fresno, says.

Adams likes history. So he knows that Allensworth was founded in 1908 by a high-ranking Black military colonel named Allen Allensworth. He escaped slavery. And his dream was to build a town completely run by and for African Americans. It was an ambitious goal to create a “freedmen’s town,” as they’re called.

Nobody had tried it in California. So Allensworth did.

“It was before its time. I’m not going to say at the wrong time, but before people were ready for that,” says Adams.

But the experiment lasted only two decades, before a series of events killed its vision.

Nearby water sources were cut off. The train station was relocated to the next town over. And people started to leave. By the 1970s, it was removed from official maps, though a few hundred people remained.

And efforts were made to ensure the town wouldn’t go away completely.

As the train arrives in Allensworth on the recent June morning, the sun is baking everything under it. There’s nothing but brown dry fields, dusty roads, and a smattering of homes. Around 500 people still live here. Nearly a third live in poverty and face regular battles with drought and access to clean drinking water.

Systemic racism is blamed for Allensworth’s decline. But through it all, it’s still standing.

Part of it became a state park – where many now have a place to celebrate Juneteenth. There, a shady tree covers little for the heat that seems to grow hotter by the year. Still, Black families laugh, sing and dance together under its large branches.

Micheryl Cooper of Wasco wheels her elderly mother around. It’s not her first time at the park, and her mother actually used to live in the town when she was raising her children. Cooper knows what her family went through is part of history. Paying visits to the town is a way to honor that.

“It’s important, and it reminds us where we came from. And we have to work hard to further ourselves,” she says.

Many here, though, still see an unfinished story.

Like that of the historical Dotson family, who prospered when the town did.

Curtis McCutchen, a California State Parks interpreter, says the Dotsons ran a blacksmith, stable and a restaurant business in Allensworth during its heyday. All three businesses were operated out of their single property.

Allensworth was supposed to be a place where Black families could provide for each other.

“It was that internal self-sufficiency and internal support that was at the core and vision of this town,” McCutchen says.

In the historical park, homes and businesses are preserved as they were 100 years ago. A parks worker pretending to be a blacksmith bangs a red-hot metal rod to demonstrate how a blacksmith would work. A freight train emblazoned with the Amazon logo of today screams along the railroad that used to be the town’s lifeline.

Glimpses of the past are everywhere.

“The railroad was the connection. It was the freeway of its day. It was the internet of its day. It was the connection to the rest of the world,” McCutchen says.

But it wasn’t able to ultimately save the town’s original vision.

Today, Michael Wright, who grew up in Bakersfield, helps his mom put on events in Allensworth through nonprofit groups that support the town’s legacy and continue to celebrate its history.

But he says many of the town’s leaders are growing older, so keeping what little is left of the town will require newer generations to step in.

“Over the last couple of years, we’ve done a good job of getting more people back out to the park, but it’s definitely not at the levels it used to be like in the 80s and early 90s,” Wright says.

Those who came out to Juneteenth this year were treated to a trumpet solo by Shayla “Trumpet Master” Belle, one of the young people who put on performances. Her cheeks swell with air as she blows into her horn.

Her mom Karmena Belle-Holland looks on as she drops down to one knee.

“None of us in our house can play like this girl,” she says with a smile.

Belle-Holland says her daughter, who lives in Stockton, is making history just by being on the grounds of Allensworth and continuing to celebrate events like Juneteenth. She dreams her daughter can make it big and be famous one day – but also remember her roots.

Standing in a town that time has tried so hard to forget, Belle-Holland says, “If [young people] never come to these types of events, how are they going to know the history?”