Parade and Rally to Kick Off Ohio Nonviolence Week in October
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Ohio Nonviolence Week is Oct. 1-7, and local events are planned to help participants consider the need for everyone to work together toward a better, nonviolent community.
The week will start with the 13th annual Nonviolence Parade and Rally at 3 p.m. Oct. 1. The parade will include walkers, cars, trucks and floats traveling from the intersection of Wick Avenue and Wood Street through downtown to the Youngstown Foundation Amphitheatre, where a rally will be held. Register for the parade HERE.
Other events scheduled include:
The Five Day Nonviolence Reading Challenge, which will conclude with a panel discussion based on the readings, sponsored by Roberta Hannay and the YWCA where the discussion will be held at noon Oct. 6. The event will include a light lunch and will be free and open to the public. Sign up for the reading challenge HERE.
A Mingle with Minni event will take place from 5 to 9 p.m. Oct. 2 at Flambeau’s Live, 2308 Market St. The event will include dinner and a chance to meet Minnijean Brown Trickey, one of the Little Rock Nine. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased HERE.
The Simeon Booker Award For Courage ceremony will take place at 7 p.m. Oct. 3 at the Tyler History Center, 325 W. Federal St. The event is free and open to the public. The speakers will be Lisa McNair and Sarah Collins Rudolph, who both lost sisters in the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, 60 years ago. McNair was born one year after her sister, Denise, was killed, while Collins suffered damage to her eyes and was the only girl of five in the restroom during the bombing to survive. Collins is the national recipient of the Simeon Booker Award for Courage, while Sister Ann Manamon, longtime director of the Dorothy Day House in Youngstown, is the local recipient. Before the ceremony, a reception will take place at 5:30 p.m. at the center. The cost is $40, and tickets can be purchased HERE.
“Speak Your Peace,” a spoken-word event, will be held at the Hopewell Theater, 702 Mahoning Ave., at 6 p.m. Oct. 4. The event is free and open to the public, as is a reception for art and poetry contest winners at the Public Library of Youngstown & Mahoning County’s Main Library from 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 5.
“Chalk Over Hate” will be held at the Jewish Community Center, 505 Gypsy Lane, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Oct. 13. A special art session titled “The Art of Emotion” will be held for children ages 6 to 13. The free program will include lunch. Reservations can be made by contacting Nic Bush at [email protected].
Nonviolence Week has been celebrated in Youngstown since 2010 when, at the request of Mahoning Valley Sojourn to the Past students, Nonviolence Week resolutions were passed by Youngstown City Council, the Youngstown City School Board, Youngstown State University trustees and Mahoning County commissioners. Former state Sen. Joe Schiavoni introduced Sojourn’s Ohio Nonviolence Week bill in the Ohio Senate. It was passed by both houses of the General Assembly and signed by former Gov. John Kasich in 2013.
Pictured at top: The 2017 Ohio Nonviolence Week parade in downtown Youngstown.
Published by The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
