WASHINGTON (AP) President Joe Biden on May 3 bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom on 19 people, including Marshall native and Grandmother of Juneteenth Opal Lee.

Biden said the recipients of the nations highest civilian honor are incredible people whose relentless curiosity, inventiveness, ingenuity and hope have kept faith in a better tomorrow.

The White House said the recipients are exemplary contributions to the prosperity, values, or security of the United States, world peace, or other significant societal, public or private endeavors.

The 10 men and nine women hail from the worlds of politics, sports, entertainment, civil rights and LGBTQ+ advocacy, science and religion. Three medals were awarded posthumously.

Lee, born in Marshall and a 1952 Wiley graduate, led the charge in championing efforts to make Juneteenth nationally recognized as a federal holiday.

The Juneteenth holiday, June 19, marks the day in 1865 when slaves in Texas finally learned that the Civil War had ended and slavery had been abolished. The news, which was delivered in Galveston by Union soldiers, came two and a half years after President Abraham Lincolns Emancipation Proclamation, which was issued in 1862 and became official Jan. 1, 1863.

President Joe Biden signed the holiday into law in 2021.

President Joe Biden hands a pen to Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif, after signing the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act, in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, June 17, 2021, in Washington. From left, Lee, Rep. Danny Davis, D-Ill., Opal Lee, Sen. Tina Smith, D-Minn., obscured, Vice President Kamala Harris, Clyburn, Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, Rep. Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, obscured, Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas. (Evan Vucci/AP File Photo)

Lee, a great-great-grandmother, decided in 2016 that shed personally trek from Fort Worth to Washington, D.C. to bring attention to the mission. With the support of her church and family, she assembled a team to assist with her walking campaign and launched a change.org petition, soliciting support in her desire to see the national recognition of a day to celebrate Freedom for All.

In her petition, Lee shared that she believed Juneteenth could be a unifier because it recognizes the fact that slaves didnt free themselves but had help from Quakers along the Underground Railroad, abolitionists both Black and white like Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison soldiers and many others who gave their lives for the freedom of the enslaved.

The celebration of Juneteenth has always been close to her heart, starting as a child growing up in Marshall, Lee said in an interview with the News Messenger in March 2023.

In Marshall, on Juneteenth, wed go to the county fairground. Oh, it would be full of music and food, there would be ballgames and food, and speeches and food, and food and food and food, she said. But when I came to Fort Worth, people just sort of celebrated in their backyards with their family and their friends.

Lee said the movement to make the observance a national holiday had already begun with the late Rev. Ronald V. Myers Sr., who founded the original National Juneteenth Observance Foundation.

Mind you, Dr. Ronald Myers had been instrumental in having Juneteenth celebrations in 43 states. And I think some of Doc rubbed off on me, she chuckled. He passed on, but I was determined to have Juneteenth a national holiday; and so, I guess I took up the mantle.

And I tell people, anybodys grandma wouldve done it, you know, she said.

... I thought that if a little old lady in tennis shoes was walking from Fort Worth to Washington, D.C., thats 1,400 miles, somebody would take notice, she said. And so, to walk two and a half, 2.5 miles each time was to symbolize that the enslaved didnt know they were free for two and a half years.

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Marshall native, 'Grandmother of Juneteenth' gets Presidential Medal of Freedom - Marshall News Messenger