Heritage Park in downtown Junction City was the site for the annual Juneteenth celebration,

Festival goers braved the heat to attend the 23rd annual event, with turnout estimated about 700 people.

One of the coordinators, Bill Brooks, said he enjoyed being a part of the Junction City community and seeing people attend. “We’ve been around for 23 years in Junction City, volunteering and getting out. We’re just asking for the love of the community to understand that there are people in the community that care whether it’s cultural or Sundown Salute. All we’re asking for the community to do is come out and be heard. There’s people wanting to listen to you and put in part of programs that makes our community so great.”

There was music, food vendors and a reading of the Emancipation Proclamation by Abraham Lincoln impersonator Steve Burns of Russell, Kansas.

Burns said this was the third year he has visited Junction City for the Juneteenth celebration. On the Emancipation Proclamation, Burns speaking in the role of Abraham Lincoln, noted during the Civil War Lincoln wanted to do something about the issue of slavery. “We needed to do something about this, because even in our own Constitution it says all men are created equal.”

The Juneteenth celebration marks the time in 1865 when slaves in Galveston Texas first learned about the Emancipation Proclamation, which President Lincoln had issued in 1863.