Roz McCommon, owner of the The Jewel on Main, 707 E. Fourth St., organized the first MLK celebration at her venue last year in Tonganoxie.

This year’s celebration had additional speakers and entertainment.

Tonganoxie City Council Member Kara Reed gave a welcome at the event before Regina Stillman directed the choir singing of “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”

Robin Easterwood and the JES Band performed a handful of songs throughout the program, with Pia King reading two poems about King.

Megan Hill portrayed Harriet Tubman leading youths along the Underground Railroad on stage and throughout the theater on three occasions.

Crystal Rhodes and Leah Ricketts performed dances during the evening,while Alexandria Kimball, a Haskell Indian Nations University graduate pursuing additional education at Kansas University. Kimball noted that her family dates back many generations in the Lawrence area and is one of the largest black families in the area. She discussed challenges that both black and Native Americans continue to face and spoke about the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Mass Choir performed “We Shall Overcome,” “Every Praise,” “Lord You Are Good,” “Nobody Greater” and “I Love to Praise Him.”

The Mass Choir, Mahalia Jackson and Megan Hill, with assistance from the audience and the children’s choir, sang “He’s Got the Whole World” before Robin and the JES Band performed “If I Can Help Somebody.”

The evening concluded with video of King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech, which King delivered Aug. 28, 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

Art and some of King’s famous quotes were on display throughout the lobby at the Jewel on Main also.

Last year, people performed songs and read literature in the lobby, while the auditorium had various stations with information newspaper clippings and more about King.

On Monday, with larger crowds and more programming, the performances moved inside the auditorium, while newspaper clippings and photos of King were on display in the lobby.