MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
If you have today off for Juneteenth, you may want to say thank you to Opal Lee. To establish today as a federal holiday commemorating the true end of slavery in the United States, she and other activists campaigned for years. And part of Lee's activism took the form of a walk - a very, very long walk from her home in Fort Worth, Texas, all the way to Washington, D.C. That is 1,400 miles, and when she did it in 2016, she was 89 years old, walking 2 1/2 miles a day. When Opal Lee and I spoke a couple of years ago, I asked about the significance of those 2 1/2 miles.
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OPAL LEE: Two and a half - it represented 2 1/2 years that the enslaved didn't know they were free, until General Gordon Granger made his way to Galveston, and he read what's known as General Order No. 3 that said, all enslaved are free. Well, he took that and nailed it to the door of what's now Reedy Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church. And when the enslaved came in from their work and somebody read that to them, they started celebrating, and we've been celebrating ever since.
KELLY: Wow. I am doing the math. Walking 2 1/2 miles a day for a distance of 1,400 miles, that's well over a year. It's more than 500 days it took you.
LEE: Well, I sort of figured somebody would give me a ride along the way.
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KELLY: Did people open up their homes to you along the way? Where'd you stay?
LEE: Oh, they did. They did. I tell you, I didn't have anybody that was negative. And people joined in the walk with me. I had one fella that I tried to give a flyer to. He brushed it aside. I decided he was late for work, so I didn't hold it against him.
KELLY: But other people were walking along just there with you?
LEE: Yes.
KELLY: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
LEE: Yes, they were, from town to town. And if I left September 2016, I actually got to Washington January 2017. And President Obama wasn't there. I didn't get to talk to him. But do you know? - we garnered 1,500,000 signatures. And we took that to Congress, and we were invited to the White House to see President Biden sign Juneteenth into law. Oh, I was a happy camper. I tell you, I could have done a holy dance, but the kids say, when I try, I'm twerking.
KELLY: (Laughter) I can picture you, how happy you must have been. So what does activism look like for you today?
LEE: I'm going to keep on walking and talking because of disparities that we have and hope that somebody does something about it. To be a whole people, to be one people is a goal that hasn't been realized yet. I want to be here when it happens.
KELLY: That is Opal Lee. Today, as she nears her 100th birthday, her friends, family, and supporters celebrated Juneteenth with another 2 1/2 miles through Fort Worth. Opal Lee's memoir, "A Committee Of One," is out now.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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