Not only are we celebrating Juneteenth here at theGrio Daily, it’s also theGrio Daily’s One Year Anniversary!. With this full rotation around the sun, Michael Harriot will let you know how and why Black Americans created the cookout. Spoiler Alert: It has a lot to do with Juneteenth.
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Michael Harriot [00:00:05] Zero Score and one year ago the people of theGrio united to form a great podcast called theGrio Daily. That’s right. It’s our one year anniversary. So today we’re going to celebrate as all Black holidays should be celebrated for Juneteenth and for the first anniversary of theGrio Daily. So we want to welcome you to the special one year anniversary of theGrio Daily, the only podcast that will explain why Juneteenth is the Original Cookout. You know, Juneteenth, I’m sure you probably know what it commemorates, but just if you don’t like it, you know, I’m sure that some white people listening to this podcast. It goes all over the world. So there might be some people in Scandinavia or Obscurastan who might be listening. So Juneteenth is an American holiday that commemorates the day that the last enslaved people were informed that they would not be enslaved anymore. June 19th, 1865, in Galveston, Texas, the Union Army marched to Galveston, Texas, and they read an order from the general that said basically Black people would be free, that slavery was now outlawed.
Michael Harriot [00:01:37] Now, technically, slavery wouldn’t be outlawed until the passage of the 13th Amendment. But for all intents and purposes, you know, it was outlawed. And, of course, Black people celebrated. Well, how did they celebrate? Well, in Galveston, they worked on plantations. So, of course, they, you know, probably got some chicken wings because, you know, they were in charge of the chicken. Probably wasn’t any more chicken wings. That was the first probably chicken wing shortage. Before COVID, I think Juneteenth was the first international chicken wing shortage. And of course, they probably fried some chicken, which is you have to remember, fried chicken is an African American invention. Black people in America were the first ones to fry chicken in hot grease. Now, some people say it was a Scottish invention, but the difference between the Scottish invention and what enslaved Africans did in America was that the Scottish didn’t bread theres. They just you know, they probably didn’t season it either, because you know. You ever taste Scottish food? Well, anyway, the Scottish just dropped chicken in high grease, but it was an African American invention to use flour to bread chicken. Remember also that flour was first grown by Juan Gorito. An African who came to America in 1525, way before 1619.
Michael Harriot [00:02:59] So you should know that fried chicken is an African American cookout tradition and a barbecue, which is also an African American tradition. Now, the Native Americans were probably the first to what we call barbecue on this continent, but it was an African American thing, too slow roast or what we call smoke, now. As a matter of fact, what the phrase pitmasters was kind of, you know, covered it because if you were a pitmaster, first of all, you got the title master, and you know that typically Black people had the title master back in the 1800s and the 1700s. But the Pitmaster was also invited to like all the get togethers, even when the enslaved people were invited. So barbecuing was a African American or Black American tradition. And I don’t know who was making white people potato salads. We don’t have any idea of the lineage of potato salad, but I’m sure it wasn’t really good until, you know, a Black woman put her stank on it. So not only was the food for the cookout African-American, but you have to remember now, Right. So Black people have been celebrating what they used to call Emancipation Day before it became a federal holiday a couple of years ago.
Michael Harriot [00:04:17] So some people celebrated it on January 1st. Right. The New Year, New Year’s Day was actually when the Emancipation Proclamation took effect. So the reason that African-American churches have watch night services was because they gathered in churches to prevent themselves from being attacked by the white people who were mad that their enslaved people were going to be free. So they were watching out on the night of the New Year. Watch night services. But, you know, that was in January. So of course, you couldn’t cook out except, you know, in the south, you can cook out whenever you want to. So you would have to imagine that they cooked out then. And then some people celebrated Emancipation Day or other day. Some people celebrated it on the 4th of July, like Black people have never celebrated Independence Day for the most part as a cultural holiday. But there were people in some parts of the country who would celebrate Emancipation Day on July 4th and cookout. Because first of all, it was warm and then like you get the day off when you were enslaved and then they could just continue that tradition.
Michael Harriot [00:05:29] First of all, you know, most enslaved people didn’t have stoves in their homes, so most of the food was prepared either outdoors or in a centralized cabin, the cabin where they probably often prepare the same food for the slave masters. And so you would have to imagine it if those enslaved people ate that day, they had a cookout and they celebrated. And Juneteenth celebrations were actually common before America recognized them. In states, especially in Galveston and all throughout Texas, people would put on their finest clothes or their cookout gear. You know, their fresh, they probably didn’t have Nike’s then or Jordans. They probably had, you know, the Holy Ghost shoes, them shoes that your your granddaddy shop in. But they put those on. There are pictures that you can see in the Library of Congress of people celebrating Juneteenth as far back as 1866. Right. And what they would do in Galveston and Houston, in Kansas City had a big one. And even after the Great Migration, when, you know, Black people said it’s too racist in the South, we got to leave here. They would have those traditional cookout for celebrations outside in parks and city parks. Kansas City had a huge one for years. Many places in the Midwest had huge Juneteenth or Emancipation Day celebrations. Like most of those, people didn’t go to HBCU, so they didn’t go to homecomings. Most of those people didn’t again, didn’t celebrate the 4th of July. Labor Day kind of came later. So there was no cookout holiday until Black people freed themselves on June 19th, 1865. It was the original cookout. You could argue that, well, people will cooked out before then. Hey, yeah, they were. But I’m talking about a national day of cookoutitry. I think that’s the technical term. Cookoutness. Cookout. Yeah, let’s just say cookoutitry. Juneteenth united Black people’s cookouting across the country. So it was the original cookout. And when Joe Biden and Congress made it a national holiday.
President Joe Biden [00:07:43] Let’s make this very Juneteenth, the first that our nation will celebrate all together as one nation.
Michael Harriot [00:07:50] We didn’t invite white people to the cookout, but we said you could have a day to yourself when you could eat the roast potato salad that you can imagine. You could put all the reasons in it that you want. You can make Kool-Aid with stevia. You could fry baloney on the grill. You could do whatever white people do. I don’t know. I’ve never been to a white cookout. I’m just imagining. But white people finally had a day that was dedicated to cookout because Black people fought so long for Juneteenth. So you’re welcome. And don’t forget to subscribe to theGrio Daily on whatever podcast platform you’re listening to it on. Don’t forget to download that Grio app because it’s really cool, man. And it’s like basically like having your own cable network. Don’t forget to tell a friend about this podcast and don’t forget that we always leave you with a Black saying. And today’s Black saying is, “I don’t know who made the potato salad, but I know it wasn’t white people.” We’ll see you next time on theGrio Daily. If you like what you heard, please give us a five star review. Download theGrio app, subscribe to the show and to share it with everyone you know. Please email all questions, suggestions and compliments to podcasts at theGrio dot com.
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