Freeman interviewed by PPH about Juneteenth

Mary Freeman, an assistant professor of New England history at the University of Maine, spoke to the Portland Press Herald about the history of the Juneteenth holiday, which Maine will observe for the first time this year after it was declared a federal holiday last year. “There has been historically not as much attention to the causes of the war and the consequences of the war, which would be slavery and emancipation. The great thing about Juneteenth is that it’s tied to the central event in American history, the Civil War, and it’s emphasizing the central part of that central event, which was the struggle over slavery and emancipation,” Freeman said. The Sun Journal shared the PPH report.