CLEVELAND, Ohio — It is obviously no secret that the Rolling Stones are in Cleveland Saturday, and as concertgoers walked through downtown wearing their Rolling Stones shirts, many made sure to stop by the MetroHealth Juneteenth Freedom Festival at Mall C near the Downtown lakefront.
It was a beautiful, bright and comfortable late spring day as Juneteeth attendees commemorated the end of slavery on June 19, 1865 through remembrance, celebration, good food, good music and even better company with people of all walks of life. The family-friendly celebration runs through 8 p.m. Saturday.
Juneteenth is all about celebrating and educating people on the rich African-American history in Cleveland, said Heather Holmes Dillard, co-founder of the MetroHealth Juneteenth festival. She noted this is the fourth time the Cleveland festival has been held.
“Fourth of July, Independence Day was the day that our country gained independence, independence of the land,” she said. “So, Juneteenth was the day that we saw freedom for all people.”
The festival has four stages and features musical acts from gospel to jazz to R&B and more throughout the day, dance performances, reading times, Juneteenth Father’s Day poetry, a DJ, more than 30 vendors, food, games, community partnership booths and even a petting zoo.
MetroHealth has an “Ask a Doc Stage,” where doctors specializing in women’s health, mental health, senior health and more offer important health information.
“I tend to call it sensory overload because just have stuff in every corner,” Holmes Dillard said. “We got games, roller skating, bumper cars, we got a chess master. So this really is something for people of all ages.”
The original Juneteenth celebrations in Galveston, Texas, were held in churches and were more of a family reunion, picnic style, she said. It was more of a gathering spot to reconnect with family who were emancipated, weren’t emancipated or didn’t know they were emancipated.
“That is what we’ve recreated here in Cleveland. People from all walks of life come and have fun and learn something. We want people to walk away with learning something,” Holmes Dillard said.
Liz Attles, 66, and Fiona Attles, 34, traveled to Cleveland from the Australian island state of Tasmania, to see The Rolling Stones, but when they looked out of their hotel room, they wanted to see what the huge festival was all about. They came to Cleveland 10 years ago to visit the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
Fiona said once they learned it was about Juneteenth, they had to come and show support and see how the locals celebrate this important time in history.
“I hope that we made some headway,” Liz said. “It’s hard to see from the outside looking in. It appears that people are becoming more genuine and the event brings more awareness to what happened in our history.”
“We need to keep celebrating it, we need to keep talking about it (Juneteenth) and bridging the gap between communities and different types of people,” Fiona said.
Fifteen-year-old Avery Ziemba, of Hinckley, said she loves learning about other cultures and try to understand those said cultures.
“I think it’s any important festival for us to all come together and celebrate,” she said.
Jeanette Jordan, 61, of Cleveland, brought her grandchildren to Juneteenth to learn about their Black heritage and know what has happened. She has always taken them to churches for Juneteenth, but has never been to the festival downtown.
“We all are one, to make a long story short,” she said as she listened to the live music as her grandchildren played nearby. “We all one color to be honest. I don’t teach my kids prejudice. I’m not prejudice. We all go the same blood running through our veins. God love us all.”
Kaylee Remington is the shopping and entertainment commerce reporter and metro reporter for cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer. Read her work online.
