YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio - The message of peace and perseverance filled the Tyler History Center Tuesday night, as the Mahoning Valley marked the 10th annual Simeon Booker Award for Courage — part of this year’s Ohio Nonviolence Week, which runs October 5 through October 11.

The award honors the late Simeon Booker, a Youngstown native and pioneering journalist whose Civil Rights reporting exposed injustice and helped unite a national movement for equality.

This year’s national recipient, JoAnne Bland, is a lifelong activist from Selma, Alabama, who marched alongside Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches. At just 11 years old, she witnessed and survived “Bloody Sunday” — one of the most violent confrontations of the Civil Rights era.

“We see so much violence everywhere,” Bland said. “It’s very important that we hold events like this so our children can understand they have the same power to make change without violence.”

Bland co-founded and directed the National Voting Rights Museum in Selma and has spent decades sharing her story and teaching younger generations about the power of peaceful activism.

Local honorees Gary and Cindy Koerth were recognized for their ongoing work on Youngstown’s South Side. Through their nonprofit coffee shop, Glenwood Grounds, they’ve turned a once-vacant building into a welcoming hub that offers community meals, mentorship, and outreach to residents in need.

“Our call to the neighborhood, to the South Side — it was one of those things that God literally spoke to us and said, this is where I want you to be,” Gary Koerth said. “It was all about serving the neighborhood so that we could build relationships and share the love of God with people.”

He said the goal has always been to build unity and make lasting change, one person at a time.

“It starts one life at a time, and nobody is exempt from it,” Gary Koerth added. “Everybody can make a difference with at least one person.”

Organizers from Mahoning Valley Sojourn to the Past said the ceremony celebrates individuals who embody the spirit of nonviolence — people working each day to bring courage, compassion, and connection into their communities.

As Ohio Nonviolence Week 2025 continues, residents are also invited to “Chalk the Walk” by writing messages of peace on sidewalks and campuses across the Valley — spreading the same message Booker championed more than half a century ago.