UPDATE 9-16-2026: Tickets have gone on sale at 6 pm Wednesday, September 16 at this link. Tickets range from $300-$750.

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Fort Worth’s iconic “Grandmother of Juneteenth,” Dr. Opal Lee, is turning 100, and the whole city is celebrating with a pretty major guest: former U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama.

Obama will come to Fort Worth on Wednesday, October 7 as part of the National Juneteenth Museum’s Uniting Voices speaker series. The event, "A Conversation with Michelle Obama," will take place at 6 pm at the Fort Worth Convention Center, according to an announcement from the museum.

The event will be open to the public, and tickets will go on sale soon, the museum says.

Ms. Opal Lee Photo courtesy of Opal Lee

The event falls on Lee’s landmark centennial birthday. For those who might need an introduction to the honoree: The Fort Worth educator and activist has spent decades advocating for Juneteenth and is widely known as the “Grandmother of Juneteenth.”

In 2016, a then-89-year-old launched Opal’s Walk 2 DC, a two-an-a-half-mile walk that evoked the two-and-a-half years it took for slaves in Texas to learn they were free. She was later alongside President Joe Biden when he signed the legislation making Juneteenth a federal holiday in 2021.

Opal Lee interacts with President Joe Biden after he signed the JuneteenthNational Independence Day Act into law in the East Room of the White House onJune 17, 2021. Getty Images

Lee’s legacy is also the catalyst for the National Juneteenth Museum, which is planned for Fort Worth’s Historic Southside. She has served as an honorary chair and board member of the museum, which will build on the work she has done for decades to preserve and share the history of Juneteenth.

In 2022, Lee was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Her nomination read, "As an advocate, Ms. Lee’s hopes to establish Juneteenth as a national holiday went far beyond just recognizing the day that the final enslaved people were notified of their freedom. It is also a symbol of her hope that we as Americans can come together and unify against social issues that are plagues on our nation such as homelessness, education inequality, and food insecurity to name a few."

The Michelle Obama conversation will cap a day of milestones for the National Juneteenth Museum. Earlier that day, the museum will host "Clearing the Way," a ceremony at the future museum site marking the clearing of the Southside Community Center and the transition toward construction of the museum’s permanent home.

Interior rendering of National Juneteenth Museum Rendering by KAI Enterprises

The Uniting Voices series launched in 2023 and has brought nationally recognized leaders and thinkers to Fort Worth for conversations about history, freedom, culture, and the future.

Previous speakers have included Equal Justice Initiative founder and executive director Bryan Stevenson, journalist and author Isabel Wilkerson, professor and filmmaker Henry Louis Gates Jr., and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Andrew Young.