Juneteenth – Jubilee Day Festival | Ohio History Connection

Now a federal holiday, Juneteenth commemorates the emancipation of enslaved African Americans.

Schedule of Events

Panels will open and close Jubilee Festival in the Ohio History Center

Ohio History Center:

10:15–11:45 a.m. – Cultural Conversations: Evolution of Black Imagery

Film screening and panel – a viewing and conversation with Ohio Black filmmakers about what it means to reclaim the narrative of Black communities and imagine/create what a future will be.

Ohio Village:

12:15–12:25 p.m. – Jubilee Parade led by Miss Juneteenth

12:30–12:55 p.m. – Town Hall Welcome & Performance with Reverend James Poindexter and Urban Strings Columbus Youth Orchestra

1:00–1:25 p.m. – Moments with Ida B. Wells and Gerald Mae

1:30–1:55 p.m. – Jumpin’ Jubilee in honor of Juba

Dance demonstration and instruction 
2:00–2:25 p.m. – Art in the Park

Storytime with Edmonia Lewis 
Storytelling with Ruth Ann
2:30–2:50 – Language of the Bell Presentation

3 p.m. – Church Service with Reverend Poindexter, Joshua McCarter Simpson and the Oak City Youth Choir

Ohio History Center:

3:45–4:55 – Afrofuturism

Cynthia Amoah – Poem
It Shall Be Jubilee: Art & The Soul of Black folk

This panel examines Afrofuturism and Afro-Nostalgia as sites of promise. We’ll discuss Black art as an inextricable aspect of the Black soul and Black soul as the exuberance of Our collective experience. In the words of Dubois, the Black artist is a cultural worker and “this, then, is the end of his striving: to be a co-worker in the kingdom of culture” and that creativity allows us to “escape both death and isolation” to create a shared future and authentic Black spaces where our memory can be free.