The energy was lively at Memorial Park in Logan Heights on Saturday, as hundreds of San Diegans joined together for the community’s annual Juneteenth celebration.
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Juneteenth, officially on June 19, commemorates the end of slavery in the U.S. It was designated a national holiday in 2021 and was honored this year in San Diego County with music festivals, poetry readings, genealogy workshops and community gatherings.
Saturday’s celebration was organized by the Cooper Family Foundation. Its founder — former San Diego resident Sidney Cooper Sr. — began the event about 50 years ago to bring southeastern San Diego together and help educate the community about Black history.
“We’re staying really true to the legacy that my grandfather created,” said Maliya Jones, Cooper’s granddaughter and the foundation’s marketing and events coordinator.
The celebration is free, which Jones says helps keep the event accessible.
Attendees on Saturday sat in the sunshine and enjoyed musical performances and stopped at booths led by community groups, including free health services and local vendors.
There was also a history wall, which has been part of the event for more than two decades. It features the story of the Black community, including its origins in Africa, slavery and racism in the U.S. and the modern-day struggle.
This year, the wall had a few new sections. One offered a historical account of the Black church experience in San Diego, and another taught about the long history of reparations in the U.S. There was also a new section on the theft of Africa — of its people, resources and continued colonization of the continent.
“If we really are trying to achieve liberation for the whole community, understanding our history is a critical piece of that,” said Dawn Miller, a high school ethnic studies teacher and one of the event volunteers who helps build the history wall. “Without our history, none of us are free.”
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Miller says this education is more important now than ever, especially as the Trump administration has worked to remove references to Black Americans and their achievements from federal institutions.
While it’s often believed that the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation — signed by President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War — immediately freed enslaved people in Confederate states, it actually took years for all enslaved people to be free.
Juneteenth honors June 19, 1865 — the day that Union troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, and announced freedom for thousands of enslaved Black people.
The 13th Amendment to the Constitution formally abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for a crime, later that year.
Sydney Cooper Jr., son of Sidney and Thelma Cooper, who started the Cooper Family Foundation’s Juneteenth celebration, greets people during the Cooper Family Foundation’s annual Juneteenth celebration at Memorial Community Park in Logan Heights. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Chaka Gallagher sings with the New Assurance Baptist Church gospel choir . (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Judah Carter, 5, and Adrienne Jackson, a friend of his family, clap to gospel music. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Sydney Antoine, 10, dances with Sadie Lee, instructor for the West African Dance group, as they perform during the Cooper Family Foundation’s annual Juneteenth celebration. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Participants in an impromptu dance lesson by T Love, center left, who is with the Dr. Bronner’s booth, background, celebrate learning his dance routine during the Cooper Family Foundation’s annual Juneteenth celebration at Memorial Community Park. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Stella Antoine, 5, performs with other children with the West African Dance group on Saturday. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Members of the Junkyard Dance Crew raise their fists at the conclusion of their performance. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Serenity Baldon, front, and others dance to the music during the Cooper Family Foundation’s annual Juneteenth celebration at Memorial Community Park in Logan Heights on Saturday, June 20, 2026. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
Sydney Cooper Jr. wears a shirt with a picture of his parents on the back during the Cooper Family Foundation’s annual Juneteenth celebration. (Hayne Palmour IV / For The San Diego Union-Tribune)
“Juneteenth marks our country’s second independence day,” according to the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Chula Vista resident Sandra Mitchell echoes that sentiment.
“This is our … celebration of our heritage and our freedom,” she said as she sat in a chair on the park’s grass, listening to the music.
She says she likes that Saturday’s annual celebration gives her the chance to be around people who look like her, since it brings the Black community together. But she adds that she hopes community members of other ethnicities join in on the event, too.
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“It’s for all of us,” Mitchell said.
