UPDATE: La Crosse’s Juneteenth celebration Saturday moved to Logan Middle

For some, this is the real Independence day. Juneteenth was officially Wednesday, but La Crosse will celebrate the fall of slavery in the US at Logan Middle School on Saturday.

The site was moved to Logan due to weather.

The group Hope Restores in La Crosse is one of the many organizations that helps put on the celebration. 

A lot of the kids’ activities run from noon to 3 p.m. Saturday, while the celebration continues through 7 p.m. with music, dance competitions, history and more.

Hope co-founder Shy Jackson said organizing the Juneteenth party is a monster, but she knows it’s appreciated.

“We’ve just lived our life in this realm of creating spaces for things to take place,” Jackson said. “We’re just so faith filled that, if we do it, they’ll show up and it always turns out that they do.”

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Jackson and her counterpart, Mya Curtis, joined La Crosse Talk PM this week to hype up Juneteenth. Curtis said, if you have kids, you definitely need to come down.

“When I say free, there is cotton candy, there are rides, there are snow cones, there’s prizes, there’s games, and there is free food,” she said. “So there is no excuse, not to bring your kids. They’re at home, getting on your nerves because it’s hot right. So get them out to this park and enjoy all these free activities for them.”

Jackson also talked about what it means to see this celebration evolve, now in its fourth year.

“The cool thing is, is that every year, we’ve been able to watch this thing grow,” Jackson said. “To see the number of families coming out, to see the boats coming up and people coming off the water, it’s absolutely amazing. Everybody having a good time, no issues. Just being really out there and enjoying one another. It’s been fabulous.”