pbeat music) ♪ ain't got time to die lord ♪ ♪ ain't got time to die lord ♪ ♪ hello america please stop with the eulogies ♪ ♪ i wrote my own narrative ♪ ♪ you don't know what to do with me ♪ ♪ i was once broken ♪ ♪ now i'm a working collage ♪ ♪ i'm the thief on the cross ♪ ♪ i'm still hanging with god ♪ ♪ my savior walked on water ♪ ♪ my ancestors can fly ♪ ♪ my skin it doesn't crack ♪ ♪ my art travels through time ♪ ♪ jesus slept in a grave ♪ ♪ but he rose feeling fine 'cause ♪ ♪ ain't got time to die ♪ ♪ their eyes were watching ♪ ♪ ain't got time ♪ ♪ ain't got time to die ♪ ♪ ain't got time ♪ ♪ just ain't got time to die ♪ (water lapping)

(people humming) the diaspora speaks through my skin. the reverberating of salty tides, rusted chain boat rides, and arriving to the shores of galveston ports. the commodity of human cargo stimulated economic growth yet it dashed the hopes of black people to a bloody pulp. american apartheid begins. the rope becomes a noose on the neck. calloused, thorn and thistle-pricked hands toiling in bloodstained cotton fields. a devastating displacement and separation of fathers and mothers from children and each other became so burdensome that the voices of the enslaved raised in unison towards the heavens for freedom.

then came four years of civil war. seven hundred thousand u.s. citizens slaughtered, four million people emancipated. but the real question was: who would tell us that we had been set free? ♪ wade in the water ♪ rasool berry: the idea of freedom is the center of the american ethos. it's our highest aspiration. and yet its opposite, slavery, is central to our origin story, america's original sin. i've come to texas to learn the true story behind juneteenth, america's newest national holiday, and the first in which we together celebrate the end of slavery. i'm here for myself, a descendant of slaves,

for my country, built with their hands and for my christian faith, which was used to justify slavery and yet became an inspiration for liberation. on the streets of galveston where the juneteenth story begins, i am greeted by a historical marker. on june 19th, 1865, two and a half years after the emancipation proclamation, general gordon granger arrived by boat with "general order iii" in hand, which stated, "all slaves are free. "this involves an absolute equality of personal rights "and the rights of property "between former masters and slaves." to understand this new freedom, i first need to understand what they were freed from.

michael waters: it's very important that when we talk about slavery, that we humanize it, right? you can miss the humanity when you emphasize ten million slaves, right? we wanna talk about someone's son, someone's daughter who made the arduous forced passage from their homeland to this country. rasool: the voices of the past echo into the present here. pastor michael waters, a native texan who has immersed himself in this history will translate them for me. michael: so we can begin with this.

this is a manila bracelet. this bracelet was the form of currency from western european countries when they went to west africa in order to purchase our ancestors as slaves. six to eight of these would allow you to buy a human being. after you had been purchased, of course, you were put in chains. these are authentic chains from ghana. just imagine, feel the weight of these, of having these placed upon you. rasool: and these would be placed on wrist or feet? michael: these would be placed on feet. okay, these are shackles. and you'd be on the ship for months before you actually set off for passage. once you came, unfortunately, to these shores, you exchanged chains. one chain for another. these would be the chains of the auction. this one right here says, "strong, healthy african negroes lot number 32." w.w wilbur, who was a slave seller from 1806. and so you have marketing and you have branding

in the selling of humanity. rasool: so this is an advertisement. michael: this is an advertisement, absolutely. ♪ well i'm working my way ♪ rasool: holding those chains was heavy, but pastor waters reminds me that to truly appreciate liberation, i have to grasp the reality of bondage. sam collins, a local historian, takes me somewhere i've always dreaded, the final destination for the enslaved. sam: we are at the varner-hogg plantation in west columbia, texas. in 1834, columbus patton

turned it into a producing agricultural location with 40 to 60 enslaved people. rasool: for the slave owner, what was life like here? sam: well, patton was very successful with regards to running the plantation. they produced a lot of sugar, and the enslaved people were the ones producing the wealth. they were not receiving the benefit, but they were doing the work and producing the wealth of this county. and for the enslaver, their wealth was in ownership of the people and in what the people produced. so it is grand, but it's not great. (somber music) rasool: attempts to defend slavery extended far beyond the plantation and found justification in a most unexpected place, the church. but how could the church, which i believe is a place to find spiritual freedom,

become a place that defended bondage? lisa fields: the first way to be okay with treating someone bad is to dehumanize them, and then you won't feel guilty for it. rasool: i reached out to an expert, lisa fields, to make sense of it all, and a good place to start was the good book itself. lisa: anti-literacy laws are created really to keep slaves from reading the bible from cover to cover because they're like, "we gotta stop them from reading the true liberation "of jesus christ through scripture "because if they see that, they're gonna want to be free "because they realize that we're all equal "at the foot of the cross." think about things like the slave bible. that supports the claim that christianity is a white man's religion. rasool: what's the slave bible? lisa: the slave bible is a bible created by white supremacists that took out all the liberation passages and passages that point to liberation and freedom and gave it to the slaves as a means to say,

"hey, this is what scripture says", to further cause them to be oppressed. rasool: so you're saying they took a bible and then cut some stuff out? like, was that just a few verses here or there? lisa: no, it was a lot of the scripture. the exodus account was removed because you gotta think about when nat turner read scripture, it caused a revolt. they didn't want them to know that they were also created in the image of god because if they were also created in the image of god, then they couldn't treat them the way they treated them. rasool: the lies and distortions of slavery stretch broad and far like old twisted branches infecting the mind, body, and soul of the enslaved and the enslaver. what was it like to be on a sugar plantation? like, what was the work like? sam: it was tiring, it was dangerous. you had to deal with snakes and mosquitoes, and they would've worked around the clock

trying to get all of the sugar cane cut and processed. rasool: and what did it look like to process it out? and what does those bowls have to do with that? sam: they heated it up to get all the impurities and things out from bowl to bowl. they kept going to smaller bowls as they heated... rasool: oh, and it would just kind of get concentrated. so, super hot. so they're heating those bowls up in... already in the hot sun, and then on top of that, fire underneath to distill it. sam: yeah. rasool: man, that's... that's intense. sam: i'm sure people died of heat strokes. sometime people got crushed in these mills if they accidentally got a shirt or something caught and got pulled through. so there was a person that had a responsibility to stand if somebody got caught, their hand, to cut it off to save their life because if that person was not there, they would just be pulled through and lost. rasool: oh, that's... that's horrific. sam: unfortunately, there was death in these spaces.

and people don't know the cost to produce this wealth that these enslavers and plantation owners enjoyed. (somber music) rasool: what's the story that people are telling themselves to make this all okay? 'cause it feels so horrific and seems so obviously wrong. michael: well, one of the things they're saying is that enslaved persons

and their enslavers were like family, that they shared meals together, that they worshiped together, that it really wasn't as bad as it might appear. here's the unfortunate reality. 23andme recently did a study that showed even in genetic makeup of americans, you can see the legacy of sexual assault. rasool: how so? michael: that so many enslavers raped their slaves, that it is a part of the genetic makeup of america, that there were more black men brought to america than black women because it was perceived that the black men would be able to work hard in the fields. and yet when you see the dna record, one of the highest contributions toward producing the next generation would be between white european men and black women. it's in our dna. that's how deep these structures and systems have harmed us,

that we see it in the dna of not just our ancestors, but of people today. (tense music) sam: so we are now here at the ruins of the slave cabins, where the enslaved people would've come to try and get some rest after a long day of hard labor. there would've been two cabins back to back. families and individuals would've been placed... rasool: oh, so this isn't like one house? this is two. sam: yes. rasool: wow. sam: and after being worked the way they were worked, there really wasn't much to do but come and lay down and hope tomorrow will be better. and sometime tomorrow got better and sometime tomorrow got worse. rasool: man, how do you keep hope, even in the midst of studying these dark things? sam: well, for me, this world is not eternal.

so this is temporary. we're journeying through this. so i hold on to the fact that the individuals survived, that even in that oppressive environment, they stayed alive and tried to make it to that next day. and ultimately, they knew that they would not be here forever, that one day they, too, would transition to true freedom. and that is my hope. don't wanna transition today. rasool: no, not today. sam: but when i do, i'll be at peace because i'll truly be free. rasool: sam's ancestors were sustained by a faith that seems to keep him going, too. back in galveston, ashton villa stands in stark contrast to the remains of the slave quarters of varner-hogg plantation. this pristinely preserved palace was built with the hands of slaves

and remains a memorial of prestige and power. here, i find competing narratives about galveston and juneteenth. at one point, it was declared the place where general gordon granger triumphantly read his order announcing freedom, but that account has been debunked as a myth created to offer a more heroic story to this iconic structure. as i sit with the complexities of galveston, i reflect on why we often find it so tempting to gloss over parts of history to make it more palatable. to better discern fact from fiction, i met up with dj cox, a local author who wrote the book, "dispelling myths about juneteenth". dj: there's this perception that nobody knew the emancipation proclamation had been issued,

but they were fully aware of it. the enslaved people may not have known, but what they knew was irrelevant because they could not emancipate themselves, otherwise they wouldn't have been enslaved all that time. and so the mentality of the state seemed to have been, if you want them, you're gonna have to come here and get them 'cause we're not gonna let them go. rasool: lawrence thomas's family were among those freed in galveston on june 19, 1865, and his father helped reinstitute juneteenth celebrations 40 years ago. how long has your family been in galveston? lawrence: since 1852. my great great grandfather was a slave to rebecca flugel, which was michel menard's fourth wife. rasool: michel menard, who's that? lawrence: that is the founder of galveston. and he, at that time, he owned my great great grandfather.

right now, we're at the actual house that michel menard and my great great grandfather lived in. the slave quarters was in the back. rasool: so this is actually where they... lawrence: this is actually where they were. yeah, this is actually the house. rasool: do you know what your family did for the menards? lawrence: no, i think it was just a typical slave. rasool: and what was your great great grandfather's name? lawrence: his name was john thomas flugel menard. rasool: okay, so he took the name of menard. lawrence: yes, part of how you identify a slave. so once he got here, menard got at it. my great great grandfather had two kids. he had william menard thomas. he put the slave name back in there, so we can remember. rasool: we're literally at the house of the founder of galveston. do you feel like your family helped build galveston? lawrence: oh, most definitely, but y'all thank god my dad's not here

'cause you wouldn't be interviewing me. you'd be interviewing him. you'd be getting a ear full of that. he'd say we built this city. rasool: to hear, "we built this city," reveals a well-earned pride in the midst of all this painful history. the emancipation proclamation is signed and goes into effect right in the middle of civil war in 1863? lawrence: correct, correct. rasool: does that change anything for your ancestors here in texas? lawrence: no, no, they were still doing the same thing. it was nothing changed. and of course, during that time, there wasn't no wifi or all that stuff going on, so they did not have a clue. they did not have a clue. rasool: so when does that change? lawrence: that changes in 1865 when gordon granger came to galveston, and that's when they all got a chance to go hear that little speech. rasool: i've never met someone like lawrence. he knows exactly who enslaved his family and when they were freed, june 19th, 1865. as we sit on the porch his ancestors built,

i can feel his sense of ownership of the place and how knowing his history has empowered him and his family to create a home here to both mourn the past and celebrate freedom. seminary professor and historian, carey latimore, shares with me the context in which general granger arrived in galveston in 1865, two and a half years after the emancipation proclamation. carey: the emancipation proclamation is an interesting document. number one, it's a presidential proclamation, so its lifespan could be the next president, but at the same time, it excludes initially the states that did not secede. and so those people who lived in those states who were enslaved were excluded. but after that january 1st date when it goes into order where the union army goes it's like a freedom force. and where they travel, freedom is going with them.

dj: unfortunately, the currently adopted texas school books say that slave owners voluntarily emancipated their slaves once they learned about the proclamation. well, now, first of all, they already knew about it, you know? rasool: right lawrence: and they voluntarily did it 'cause there were guns pointed at them. you know? "let 'em go." they said, "okay, well, you know, i'm just playing." sharon gillins: the soldiers didn't come here to inform. they came here to enforce. rasool: that's good, there you go. sharon gillins, a galvestonian genealogist, brought me to the exact spot where the words of absolute equality were first heard. her description of the reaction to those words helped me visualize what that day looked like. sharon: you can just imagine, you find out you're free. there's a party on every corner, of course. as soon as the dock workers saw that ship pull in,

there was dancing on the docks, of course. and they went out, spread out and let everybody know that the troops were here. rasool: that must have been quite a sight, you think. dj: you know, when you think about the population of galveston was supposedly around 10,000 people, and you've got 6,000 soldiers there, you know, it's like almost everybody had their own soldiers to tell 'em, "okay, let 'em go." rasool: and then 4,000 of those soldiers would've been black. and many of them, the african american population in galveston, they had never seen a black soldier. now you see thousands of 'em. carey: think of if you were on the field and you see this, a force of black men enter into where you are. you've never seen anything like that. you've never seen a black person in any sense of authority. but now, that's inspiring, isn't it?

rasool: yes. carey: that's transformative. we think that barack obama becoming president, think about what that meant to so many african americans. they say, to see a black man in that position. i would argue this was even more transformative because of where those people were at that point in time. everything that they had to do was regulated, but to see these men walking in and liberating them, think about what that means. (upbeat music) (sounds of soldiers marching and shouting) sharon: after enslaved people were emancipated, their first official celebration that took place in galveston started right here at the old galveston courthouse. rasool: right here. sharon: right here, and it consisted of a processional from the old galveston courthouse to the colored church on broadway.

and the colored church on broadway was reedy chapel ame church. on january 2nd, there's an article about the processional. it talks about how many people were there. it talks about the weather was extremely cold and raining that day. and they talked about the fact that the women walked on the sidewalk and the men walked in the street, and that the ladies' ankles were exposed because they had to lift their skirts to keep them from getting wet. rasool: so you're telling me the first, like, official citywide celebration of juneteenth happened in january? sharon: yes, it did. and the reason it happened in january is because january 1st was the official effective date of the emancipation proclamation, so this happened more than two and a half years after that. rasool: this procession starts here and it goes to reedy chapel. why the decision for them to end the procession there?

sharon: i think they were prayerful and just joyously happy that god had answered their prayers to grant them freedom. and so what they did when they went there was they sang, they prayed, they gave thanks for the opportunity to change their lives. they still had the faith, even through all those many years of enslavement, they had the faith that they would soon be free. (bell chiming) (upbeat music) diane moore: reedy chapel ame church is the oldest african methodist episcopal church in the state of texas. this church was founded in 1848. they set it up as a place where their slaves could worship. when the civil war was over, they deeded the church to the formerly enslaved people.

rasool: wow, so, i mean, 1848, that's several decades. diane: 174 years ago, we just celebrated the 174th anniversary this month. rasool: this is really, like, where juneteenth starts, in terms of as a celebration. of all the places that someone could gather, why a church? diane: well, people who had been coming to this church had heard about the israelites, slavery there, and this is... this reminds them of that. and then harriet tubman was called moses. and the songs that were used to let 'em know, "okay, it's time," all the people. "go this place, go this way," and all that kind of thing. so a church was in the background. rasool: what do you think was the mood like? diane: i would think that people were very exuberant, you know? because this was the first time they found out that they were free. in fact, it's said that for that 4th of july, it was the black people that celebrated in 1865,

because others considered that's part of the union. rasool: that is really interesting. so, like, 4th of july, 1865, as they say, it hit different. diane: it hit differently. ♪ freedom is the only thing i need ♪ ♪ freedom the only thing i need indeed ♪ ♪ freedom come and fill me with your truth ♪ ♪ come and let your light shine through on me ♪ rasool: after 246 years, and generations of families living their whole lives in bondage, the institution of slavery came to an end and the new chapter in the american story began. ♪ i am free indeed ♪ sharon: what next? generations of people have been enslaved.

they had no agency over themselves. they didn't know how to make a new life. they had to figure all of that out. carey: once juneteenth happened, and those slaves felt the touch of freedom, the promise of freedom, the fulfillment of their hopes and dreams, that means something psychologically. you can't break a person in the same kind of way when they know who they are, when they know what their rights are. so that's changed. what hasn't changed is the racism they're gonna have to deal with, and that may have actually gotten worse. (melancholy music) rasool: it had never occurred to me that things could actually get worse after the end of slavery, but a form of racial mob violence replaced the lash as the primary form of intimidation throughout the south. michael: in the years following emancipation, the number of lynchings that happened all across texas

were at least 800 within that first year of freedom. rasool: 800 just within? michael: in that first year of freedom, 800 lynchings across the state of texas. rasool: what do you think accounts for that? i mean, that's more than two a day. michael: exactly, i think it's a rage of a system and society changing and you're fearful of what place you'll have in that society. rasool: that new society was initially enforced by union troops, but after reconstruction, violence and terror were utilized to prevent blacks from voting and to reestablish the previous racial caste system that thrived during slavery. michael: this is a lynching depiction of where they have placed an image of a black man hanging on a tree in art.