‘Juneteenth freed the people’: Opal Lee leads hundreds on freedom walk through Dallas

Opal Lee walked outside and waved. That was all it took. Crowds clamored for a glimpse. People shouted her name and snapped photographs as television crews aimed their cameras at her.

Wearing sunglasses, a blue T-shirt and red tennis shoes, Lee led hundreds Wednesday on her annual Opal’s Walk for Freedom, a 2.5-mile trek to celebrate Juneteenth.

This year’s walk moved from Lee’s hometown of Fort Worth to Dallas, but the 97-year-old “grandmother of Juneteenth” drew the same big crowds and adoration. Supporters wore T-shirts and carried signs bearing her image, and many clapped and waved as she walked by.

Juneteenth recognizes the day in 1865 when Union troops arrived in Galveston to inform enslaved people of their freedom, about 2½ years after President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

“July 4 freed the land,” Lee said before the walk. “But Juneteenth freed the people.”

Black Americans, especially in Texas, have celebrated the day for decades, but interest in the holiday skyrocketed in recent years. In 2016, Lee made her way from Fort Worth to Washington, D.C., walking 2½ miles in several cities along the way to represent the 2½ years it took for news of emancipation to reach Galveston. In 2021, President Joe Biden, with Lee at his side, signed into law a bill declaring Juneteenth a national holiday.

Growing up, Tiffany Weaver, 45, said she celebrated the holiday with friends and family eating barbecue and playing outside. This year she joined Lee’s walk, which began at the African American Museum in Dallas’ Fair Park.

Weaver, who lives in Dallas, said she loves that Juneteenth is now celebrated on a larger scale.

“We weren’t free until we were all free,” she said. “This has been a long time coming.”

Stanton Brown, 32, of McKinney, who brought his infant and 4-year-old daughters to the walk, said he long knew about Juneteenth but only began celebrating the day in recent years.

“Freedom is really a mindset,” Brown said. “I want to honor the people who came before me and fought for freedom. I’m here because of them.”

As they walked, marchers clasped hands and some sang “This Little Light of Mine.” Parents pushed young children in strollers or carried them on shoulders, and Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders walked alongside marching band drummers and members of a Girl Scouts troop.

Traditional African dancers and drummers lined the route and walked next to Lee, flanked by Fort Worth’s Miss Juneteenth and a cluster of police officers.

Many fanned themselves from the heat, which hovered in the 80s for most of the walk, cooler than in past years.

Lee, who grew up in Texas, has recalled celebrating Juneteenth by picnicking with her family, first in Marshall and later in Fort Worth. In 1939, when she was 12, a mob of white supremacists set fire to her family’s home in Fort Worth and destroyed it. Lee and her family were forced to flee. The event shaped her life as an educator and activist.

Lee received a new home this month, courtesy of the community, on the same lot.

This year’s walk moved to Dallas to highlight the role Juneteenth has on other U.S. cities, Lee’s granddaughter, Dione Sims said. Cities around the world planned their own walks, including Los Angeles, Chicago, New York City and Tokyo. Next year, the march will return to Fort Worth before heading to Washington, D.C., in 2026.

On Wednesday, Lee, who rode in a golf cart for part of the walk, said her work is far from over, and she urged supporters to tackle homelessness and climate change.

“If people can be taught to hate, they can be taught to love,” she said. “We are all our brother’s keeper. It behooves us to act like it.”