I'm a fourth-generation descendent of Jack Yates, a Juneteenth pioneer. Here's why his legacy is worth appreciating.

• Shelby Stewart is a fourth-generation descendant of Jack Yates, a Juneteenth pioneer.
• He helped establish Emancipation Park in Houston, Texas, one of the first places Juneteenth was celebrated.

Recollections of family history – specifically for African Americans – are sobering reminders that we're only a few generations removed from the injustices of slavery, discrimination, and segregation.

My fourth great grandfather, John Henry "Jack" Yates, was solidified history in 1872 when he, along with Elias Dibble, Richard Allen, and Richard Brock, purchased $800 worth of acreage in Houston, Texas. They named it Emancipation Park and it became the first place Freedom Day, now Juneteenth, was celebrated.

Purchasing land meant ownership, a concept foreign to most formerly enslaved people. Eventually, Juneteenth became an annual holiday where African Americans put on their fanciest threads and joined together to celebrate and delight in red-hued foods, like watermelon and red velvet cake — symbolic of the blood shed by our ancestors.

My family never missed an opportunity to share these stories with me as a young girl. The parcel of land my grandfather purchased will celebrate its 150th anniversary on Sunday, a remarkable feat for the city's oldest park site. The two-day commemoration will be one of Houston's most significant yet with lectures on social justice and performances from the Isley Brothers, Kool & The Gang, Sheila E., and Frankie Beverly and Maze. Though Juneteenth became a federal holiday last year and celebrations seem flashier than before, my immediate family will still gather in a smaller setting to share stories of our fondest memories of Juneteenth and our trailblazing patriarch.

Yates has one of the most recognizable legacies in post-civil war Houston. Born into slavery in July 1828 in Gloucester County, Virginia to enslaved parents, it is said that education was instilled in him from a very young age, and he eventually learned to read and write — a blasphemous act for the time.

"Education to Jack Yates was extremely important," said my paternal grandmother, Jacqueline Whiting Bostic, great-granddaughter of Yates. "He understood that reading and writing would be the key to functioning in a society that slaves were newly a part of and they would have to create a living for themselves."

In 1868, he was ordained as a Baptist minister and would go on to pastor the First African American Baptist Church only seven months after enslaved people learned of their freedom. Along with Emancipation Park, the church was one of the few properties purchased by African Americans at the time and was renamed Antioch Missionary Baptist Church under Yates' tutelage. It's still operational today.

Yates' civic efforts can't be understated. Throughout Houston, you'll find markers of his impact. In January, Yates' former home was designated a historical site by the Heritage Society. But, to me, the most significant honor, is Jack Yates High School. Houston Independent School District broke ground in the city's Third Ward in 1926. The school went on to become one of Houston's most notable high schools with such prestigious alumni as actresses Phylicia Rashad and Debbie Allen, journalist Roland Martin, and professional athletes Daymean Dotson, Santana Dotson, and Dexter Manley.

"It doesn't matter what class you graduated from; it's JY 'til you die," said Joyce Brown, a 1987 graduate of Jack Yates. "Everyone has a strong sense of pride because it was imparted in us. We were taught in school to be the best at everything — from academics to choir to sports."

George Floyd also attended Jack Yates High School. The football field he once played on now bears his name: George Perry Floyd Community and Athletic Field.

"It's very important that everybody educates themselves and know our history because it's their history, the history of the United States. When we think about the Civil War, as it applies to slavery, people still would like to deny that it ever happened," Bostic explained. "But there were more people killed in the Civil War than in any war we have ever fought in America. Yet very few people ever discuss the Civil War. It's like it's something people don't want to know about."