FORT WORTH, Texas – Opal Lee marked her 100th birthday Wednesday by helping launch construction of a museum in her Texas hometown devoted to the history of Juneteenth, the holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.
“It was important for us to do this on this date because everything we’ve done for the last several years, everything we continue to do, is built around the spirit of the venerable Miss Opal Lee,” said Jarred Howard, CEO of the planned National Juneteenth Museum in Fort Worth.
Lee, a founding member of the museum’s board, became known as the “grandmother of Juneteenth” after years of campaigning for June 19 to receive federal recognition. When then-President Joe Biden signed legislation establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday in 2021, Lee stood beside him.
Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers arrived in Galveston at the close of the Civil War carrying an order that declared enslaved people in Texas free. That came roughly 2 1/2 years after the Emancipation Proclamation freed enslaved people in the Confederate states that remained in rebellion. Six months later, ratification of the 13th Amendment permanently abolished slavery in the United States.
Lee said she was happy and grateful during Wednesday’s ceremony, where crews began demolishing a building to make way for the planned 50,000-square-foot (4,600-square-meter) museum in a historically Black neighborhood.
The event also featured the announcement that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would contribute $3 million to the museum’s construction and the creation of a genealogy center inside it.
“I’m so happy I could do a holy dance, and these old legs won’t respond, but let me tell you how thankful I am and that this deed won’t go unnoticed,” Lee said after the donation was announced.
In Fort Worth, Lee has spent decades serving as a teacher, counselor and community activist, becoming one of the city’s most influential advocates for Juneteenth.
She has recalled fond childhood memories of celebrating Juneteenth with food, music and games. As an adult, Lee helped organize the holiday’s celebrations in Fort Worth.
“Long before there were historic walks, cameras, books and well-deserved national acclaim, my childhood memories are filled with you making sure that Fort Worth remembered,” U.S. Magistrate Judge Renee H. Toliver said during the ceremony.
Addressing Lee, who was seated in the audience, Toliver recalled how she organized community events, parades and festivals.
“You always reminded us that history is not something you leave behind, it’s something you actively protect,” Toliver said.
The museum will rise near the home built for Lee a few years ago on the same tree-lined corner lot from which her family was forced out by a racist mob when she was a young girl.
Lee was 12 when, on Juneteenth in 1939, a white mob numbering in the hundreds descended on her Black family’s home, just days after they moved into a white neighborhood. Newspaper reports from the time said the mob smashed windows and furniture.
Lee’s birthday celebration continues Wednesday evening, when the museum will host a conversation with former first lady Michelle Obama at the city’s convention center.
