Locals will celebrate culture and togetherness Saturday with the observance of the fifth annual Juneteenth Jumpoff.
County and city offices are closed today in observance of Juneteenth, a federal holiday established very recently in 2021. But Amelia Island saw its inaugural Juneteenth celebration one year prior to its official status.
In June 2020, a local organization was born with one core mission: To provide a celebration of culture and history through an event centered on unity and in honor of the day of celebration.
President of 4 The Culture, Tiffany Harris, said the event originally was meant to have a family-reunion feel, which set the foundation for the close-knit community vibe.
Harris said if there’s any reason to come to the event, it would be for just that.
“It’s the unity, it’s the togetherness for me, it’s the being family-oriented,” she said. “Just being amongst each other, just fellowshipping.”
This year’s Juneteenth Jumpoff will be from noon to 6 p.m. Saturday at Peck Center Park and Charles Eugene Richo Field, 516 S. 10th St. in Fernandina Beach.
Harris said the free-to-the-public, “bring-your-own-tent,” family-oriented event will have food vendors, nonprofits, political tables, arts and crafts, music and “anything that can showcase who we are and what we represent.”
She said she and a colleague of hers came up with the idea of the inaugural Juneteenth celebration in 2020 to create a way to celebrate their Black heritage and promote unity.
Harris said, “Juneteenth for Fernandina was initially berthed after the George Floyd, Black Lives movement, when the whole chaos of the world was … shifting.”
The inaugural event was held less than a month after the George Floyd tragedy, which occurred May 25, 2020. The incident involved the death of Floyd at the hands of a police officer. It sparked protests across the nation, all the way down to Amelia Island and beyond.
On June 10, 2020, the News-Leader reported two separate protests in a week related to the violent case. Though several protests across the nation turned violent, both protests in the city were peaceful and received police escorts.
In the wake of the chaos and violence, Harris said, “We wanted to bring something different, or a different perspective of how people viewed us and how we should be celebrated.”
So she started contacting people and found others who were on board with the idea. From there, 4 The Culture was born and the Juneteenth Jumpoff was created.
The Fernandina Beach-based organization’s mission “initially was, and still is, basically to be for all people, to bring awareness to the community, bring awareness to Northeast Florida and most definitely bring awareness to ourselves,” Harris said.
She said the event also is meant to showcase layers of history that aren’t normally exposed.
Juneteenth is known as the second Independence Day in America by many and had been celebrated for more than 150 years before its establishment as an official federal holiday by President Joe Biden on June 17, 2021. The holiday marks the day the last of the African American slaves were notified of their freedom.
On June 19, 1865, Union Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas, to announce the end of the Civil War and the freedom to those who were still enslaved. Though the emancipation proclamation was signed more than two years prior, June 19 is a day that is now marked as a powerful symbol of freedom for many and an important date in Black history and American history.
Black American history also is deep in the land the Juneteenth Jumpoff celebrations are held on. Peck Center Park is named for the historic Peck Center, once Peck High School and, before that, Colored School No. 1.
A historical marker is placed outside the Peck Center, recognizing Peck High School. It reads: “The groundwork for Peck High School started in 1880, when a group led by Henry B. Delaney petitioned for an African American school in Fernandina. In 1885, a four-room building known as Colored School No. 1 opened at Atlantic Avenue and 11th Street.”
The marker goes on to tell of the first principal, Moses H. Payne, and the first vice principal, William H. Peck. Peck became the second principal after Payne’s death, and he held the post for 43 years. Through Peck’s advocacy, a larger parcel of land was acquired to build what became Peck High School in 1909.
Community members also used the building in the evening as a meeting place for community groups. The school was closed in 1969, when Fernandina desegregated schools and, by the mid 70s, it was vacant. In the 90s, through advocacy of locals and money from state grants and the city of Fernandina Beach, it was restored and reopened as the Peck Center.
Charles Eugene Richo Field is named for another Black community member of Fernandina Beach and a graduate from Peck High School.
Richo graduated from Peck in 1959, according to the Fernandina Beach Resolution that recognized the sports field’s new name in 2015. Richo dedicated more than two decades to youth sports, even contributing to the development of new programs. The Peck Alumni Association signed a letter of support for the decision to name the sports field after him, which stated, “Charles Eugene ‘Gene’ Richo is a good and worthy choice.”
The Juneteenth event to be held there Saturday is a salute to the community’s history in Peck, Richo, those who met with their community groups there 100 or more years ago and the many who attended and held pride in the community staple that was Peck High School.
Learn more about Juneteenth from The National Museum of African American History and Culture at https://nmaahc.si.edu/juneteenth.
For more information about 4 The Culture, the group can be found on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/4TheCultNassau.
achandler@fbnewsleader.com