The Union County Community Remembrance Project will host the 2023 Juneteenth Remembrance and Celebration on Saturday, June 17th in downtown Union. The 2023 theme is “Truth, Memory, and Reconciliation.” SC Humanities supported this event with a Mini Grant.
The Union Juneteenth Remembrance and Celebration will feature historians and genealogists, vendors, performers, a Kids Zone, a community art installation, tours of the historic jail, food trucks, and information about education, health, and life skills.
The event will feature three main humanities presenters: genealogist Robin Foster, living historian Tyrie Rowell, and African Americana artifact collector Philip J. Merrill. They will be stationed at booths, and Merrill and Rowell will also be scheduled to give formal presentations at specific times throughout the day.
The Juneteenth Remembrance and Celebration will take place from 4:00 – 8:00 p.m. at the L.W. Long Community Resource Center (also known as the old Union Community Hospital where Dr. L.W. Long served Black citizens for over 40 years with medical care) at 213 West Main Street, Union, 29379 and Main Street, rain or shine.
The Project Director said that one of the goals of the event is to “bring people of all ages, races, and backgrounds together in a setting that promotes dialogue and learning about the history of difficult subjects, including slavery and lynchings.”
Learn more about the Union Juneteenth Remembrance and Celebration HERE. The Union County Remembrance Project was formed in 2019 with the mission to document and recognize the history of lynching and racial terrorism in Union County.
The mission of SC Humanities is to enrich the cultural and intellectual lives of all South Carolinians. Established in 1973, this 501(c) 3 organization is governed by a volunteer 20-member Board of Directors comprised of community leaders from throughout the state. It presents and/or supports literary initiatives, lectures, exhibits, festivals, publications, oral history projects, videos and other humanities-based experiences that directly or indirectly reach more than 250,000 citizens annually. South Carolina Humanities receives funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities as well as corporate, foundation and individual donors. The National Endowment for the Humanities: Democracy demands wisdom.
