Feminist to Know: Opal Lee
Opal Lee is an educator and activist known as the “Grandmother of Juneteenth” due to her significant work in having Juneteenth designated as a federal holiday.
Lee credits her commitment to activism to her childhood experience of a traumatizing hate crime. When she was just twelve years old, her family home––located in a predominantly white neighborhood in Fort Worth, Texas––was vandalized and set on fire by a mob of 500 white supremacists. Thankfully, Lee and her family were safe; however, her house was destroyed, and the perpetrators were protected by local law enforcement. The experience was foundational for Lee, who felt compelled to pursue a career in education and activism.
Juneteenth celebrates the day that marked the effective end of slavery, when the enslaved Black people of Galveston, Texas were finally informed of the Emancipation Proclamation, which had officially taken effect two and a half years prior. Opal Lee’s first activism began with helping the economically disadvantaged in her community and then progressed to focusing on preserving Black history. Her passion for addressing injustices in her commitment to historical preservation combined with her work for national recognition of Juneteenth.
Though she had spent years campaigning for Juneteenth to be recognized as a national holiday, Lee’s activism only gained national attention in 2016 when at the age of 89 she pledged to walk from her home in Fort Worth to Washington D.C. Lee departed in September 2016 and walked 2.5 miles a day to symbolize the two and a half years that Black Texans remained enslaved after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued. She arrived in Washington, D.C. in January 2017.
When the New York Times asked about the symbolic difference between Juneteenth and the Fourth of July, Lee answered, “The difference between Juneteenth and the 4th of July? Woo, girl! The fact is none of us are free till we’re all free. So, the 4th of July? Slaves weren’t free. You know that, don’t you?”
Lee’s activism is centered on the concept that none of us is free until everyone is free. She expressly connected her Juneteenth activism to other pressing social issues: “You know, we need some decent education and some decent jobs that pay money, and we need health care and all kinds of things.” In the same vein, she maintained a community garden, food bank, and farm throughout the early stages of the COVID crisis.
In 2021, President Biden finally adopted Juneteenth as a national holiday, the first new national holiday since MLK Day was adopted in 1983. Opal Lee was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her activism in 2024.