Juneteenth is not a “sale” day or a block party but is a way for us to proudly honor and learn from the hard-fought victories of our ancestors. In our 5th Annual Juneteenth Celebration we will once again shutdown Nostrand Ave between Putnam and Jefferson.  Our theme: The Victory of Resistance is Freedom continues our year long commemoration of Malcolm X, Patrice Lumumba, and Frantz Fanon in the 100 year of their births.

The festivities will begin at noon and we will have something for everyone: music, drumming, dancers, speakers, activities for the children, and a fashion show.

Juneteenth also commemorates the continued struggle and resistance in our fight for freedom. Below is a selected New York City timeline that begins with the first Ancestor in New York to Malcolm X’s birthday 100 years ago.

A Timeline of Resistance!

25 ancestors whose collective struggles helped shape Malcolm’s life and legacy.

(1) Juan Rodriguez is described as a “mulatto” of African ancestry from the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo. In 1613, he was aboard a Dutch ship that sailed to Manhattan to trade with the indigenous Munsee branch of the Lenape people. After the trade mission, Rodriguez refused to leave when the ship departed back to the Netherlands. Shipping records indicate that he lived among the Munsee for the year it took the ship to return. Logs record a conflict involving Rodriguez, as he did not trade exclusively with the Dutch or follow their terms. The year Rodriguez spent in Manhattan—after which nothing more is known about him—makes him the first non-indigenous person to settle there.

(2) Simon Congo, (3) Jan Negro, and (4) Big Manuel were three of our thirty ancestors who petitioned the Dutch West India Company in 1644 and were granted “half freedom” after eighteen years of servitude. Under this arrangement, their children remained enslaved to the Company. They formed a buffer population between Dutch settlers and the Lenape people in the area now known as Greenwich and built the fortifications, including “Wall Street.” However, after the British seized Lenape territory from the Dutch, their limited freedoms were dissolved.

(5) Kwaku (Quack) and (6) Kofi (Cuffee) are two of the 24 enslaved ancestors who led a rebellion in 1712.They set fire to a commercial building on the evening of April 6th. When the whites panicked to put out the fire they attacked. They killed 8 and injured many more. All of the freedom fighters were eventually captured and executed but it struck a blow as one of the first major uprisings and resulted in stiffer “slave codes” in New York City.

(7) King Charles of Albany was one of the most famous figures associated with the rise of the Pinkster festival celebrated by Africans throughout the state of New York but particularly Brooklyn. It derives from a Dutch Pentecost tradition but when Africans adopted it in the 1790s it became exclusively associated with days of African song, drumming, dance, and games. It is considered one of the earliest African holidays in North America.

(8) James Varick was the founding bishop of the Mother African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. In 1796, he led his congregation out of the John Street Methodist Church. Although the John Street Church held an abolitionist stance against slavery, it still practiced racial segregation. Mother Zion initially met at various locations downtown and throughout Manhattan before establishing a permanent home in Harlem in 1914.

(9) Andrew Williams, along with (10) Epiphany Davis, was among the first to purchase property in 1827 in what would become Seneca Village—the first free settlement of African Americans in New York City. The area, now part of Central Park, stretched from 82nd Street to 87th Street on the Upper West Side. Mother Zion AME Church and the New York African Society for Mutual Relief were instrumental in establishing plots for the village’s 225 residents before they were forcibly removed in 1857 to make way for the construction of Central Park.

James Weeks (11), a Black Stevedore, in 1838 bought the first plot of land and built a house in the community that would later become known as Weeksville in Brooklyn. It is the oldest preserved Black community in New York. Weeksville served as a refuge for enslaved Africans and the later cultural and political development. Most significantly, Weeksville was a refuge and defense against the deadly Draft Riots of 1863.

Elizabeth Jennings Graham (12) became one of the first Civil Rights heroes in 1854 when she protested Jim Crow in New York before it was later established in the South. She insisted on her right to ride on an available New York City streetcar at a time when all such companies were private and most operated segregated cars. Her case was decided in her favor in 1855, and it led to the eventual desegregation of all New York City transit systems by 1865.

Frederick Douglass (13) was instrumental in 1850 in organizing the The American League of Colored Laborers (ALCL) in New York City. Where Black laborers were barred from entering white unions Douglass, along with others started the ALCL. As the Vice President he promoted unity among mechanics, fostered training in agriculture, industrial arts, and commerce, and assisted members in establishing business for themselves.

Elizabeth Marshall 6 years old, Ellen Kirke 2 years old, and William Steven 3 years old are 3 of the 20 children that were killed during New York City Draft Riots which turned into the biggest race riot in the country’s history. For four days Irish mobs assaulted, tortured, and killed Black New Yorkers in the streets and targeted their homes, businesses, and churches for destruction. At least 120 people were killed, over 2000 injured, and an estimated 25% of the City’s Black population displaced; although many historians believe the death toll to be much higher.

Frank Thompson (17) was the head waiter at the New York Argyle Hotel when he formed the New York Cuban Giants in 1885. Initially formed to entertain hotel guests the team became an independent salaried team that would help pave the way for many other teams, decades before Rube Foster founded the National Negro Leagues. The team took its name because it played in Cuba during the winter of 1885-1886 and the winter of 1886-1887.

(18) W.E.B. Du Bois , (19)Ida B. Wells, (20) Mary Church Terrell, and (21) William Monroe Trotter  were three of the most prominent African Americans protesting racial violence in the United States. The Niagara Movement and the National Negro Committee were predecessors to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which was founded in New York City in 1909 in response to the Springfield Race Riot of 1908.

 (22) Marcus Garvey immigrated to the United States in 1916 at the invitation of Booker T. Washington. Although Washington was deceased in 1915 Marcus Garvey came to Harlem and began his nationwide fund-raising tour to launch the New York division of Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) in 1918.

 (23) Hubert Harrison started The Voice magazine in 1917. Known as “The Father of Black Radicalism” he was the first organizer in the Socialist party and became the most seminal figure in the development of Black left tradition in the United States. He influenced a generation of thinkers such as Marcus Garvey, A. Phillip Randolph, Cyril V. Briggs and the New Negro Movement radicals through the publication of The Voice.

(24) Queen Mother Audley Moore  moved to Harlem in 1922 although originally from Louisiana. Attracted to the movement by Marcus Garvey and a member of the Communist Party she emerged as one of the most important Black Nationalist leaders of the 20th century. She served as a mentor and advisor to Malcolm X, particularly in his development of Black nationalist ideas and his understanding of Black internationalism. She is perhaps the most significant figure in the modern reparations movement.

(25) A. Philip Randolph  started the Brotherhood of the Sleeping Car Porters and Maids in 1925. An early socialist in the Black Harlem tradition he applied an economic approach to Civil Rights. Randolph founded the first Black labor union to be chartered with the American Federation of Laborers. This formation was essential to the mounting Civil Rights Movement as the March on Washington Movement spanned the 1930s to 1963.