By: Taylor Christensen | Royal Oak Review | Published June 15, 2026
ROYAL OAK — The sixth annual Juneteenth celebration in Royal Oak will return from 3 to 7 p.m. June 19 at the Royal Oak Farmers Market.
The day will include an afternoon of live music, food trucks, community vendors, culture and family-friendly fun.
The theme for this year’s Juneteenth is “One Community. One History. One Future. Together.”
Organizer of the event Lakeesha Morrison said that the goal with this Juneteenth event is to educate the community on the history of the day, commemorating the emancipation of enslaved African Americans in Galveston, Texas, on June 19, 1865. The Emancipation Proclamation took effect Jan. 1, 1863, but the Union Army did not reach Galveston until 1865.
“A lot of our communities still don’t know the importance of Juneteenth and really don’t even know why we celebrate it, or the meaning,” Morrison said. “I think it needs to be celebrated across the entire nation, because at the end of the day, a lot of our fellow Black Americans were never acknowledged as free until 1865, and even then some of the slaves were still not free at the moment.”
During the event, there will be a variety of educational displays and speakers to help shed light on Juneteenth.
One of the returning displays will be on the Hamer Finch Wilkins families, of which Morrison is a descendant. These are some of the pioneering Black families that settled in Royal Oak.
There will also be a new display educating the community on the history of Black Americans in the Civil War, and their part in the fight.
Historian Dr. David L. Head will also be in attendance.
“He is probably going to be traveling down a timeline of Black excellence in America,” she said. “This is kind of the same thing that we have been doing the last few years; education is one of our biggest things to make sure that the community stays educated on why we celebrate Juneteenth.”
The main event on Juneteenth is the walk of 1,865 steps for the year 1865. This year, the organizers of the event will be collecting socks for a sock drive.
“We are doing a sock drive for our homeless community, because that is very important for a lot of homeless people. The most requested thing is socks,” she said. “So, we are going to do the 1,865 steps that we always do. They march around the Centennial grounds, and we are going to be collecting socks and donating them to the homeless community in Royal Oak.”
The day will include a reading section for kids. Endeah Canty, author of “The Magical Shell,” will be reading her book to the youth and passing out copies.
Austen Brantley, the artist behind the bust of Elizabeth Hamer made for Hamer Finch Wilkins Park, will also be in attendance doing an artist demonstration.
Attendees can also browse the vendors who will be selling a variety of crafts and items.
“This is a community event for children of all ages. There’s going to be plenty of vendors for people to go shopping and to look at arts and crafts,” Morrison said.
Morrison said she predicts that this will be another educational and fun year for Juneteenth in Royal Oak.
“A lot of children need to know the true story behind why we celebrate it, even if it’s raw or scary or a very big disappointment in American history,” Morrison said. “A lot of people still have their blindfolds on and are not educated on the importance of Juneteenth, so there is a lot of history that needs to be told, and as much as we want to see that we have such a big, diverse city, we really don’t. So, allowing people to celebrate with us will allow other people to be comfortable in a community that celebrates Juneteenth.”
For more information on Juneteenth in Royal Oak, visit romi.gov.