The Oldham County Historical Society would like to announce Dr.Kevin Wayne Cosby as the recipient of the 2007 Elijah Marrs Achievement Award. The award is given annually in honor of Mr. Elijah Marrs (1840-1910) a preacher, writer and educator born into slavery who escaped and joined the Union army at Ft. Nelson. Marrs recruited local slaves to join the Union. He moved to LaGrange and taught at the 2 Freedman Schools along with his brother Henry. At one time Mr. Marrs said he had 140 children in his Sunday School class at LaGrange. On November 25, 1875, he helped to open the Baptist Normal and Theological Institute in Louisville. In 1883 the school changed its name to State University and later to Simmons University then to Simmons Bible College. In 1880 Marrs took up the pastorate of Beargrass Baptist Church in Crescent Hill. In 1883 Marrs was invited to teach in the Jefferson County School District at a district colored school. As a politician he was delegate to every major politicial convention, constantly promoting African American political and Civil Rights. He was the first elected African American official in Oldham County as the stump for the Republican Party. He was activist in voter registration campaigns in 1870, the first year blacks could vote. He is buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Louisville.
The Elijah Marrs Achievement award is given to recipients who change the course of local history in their community. Dr. Cosby is a very appropriate recipient of the Marrs Award due to his faithful and tenured service to his community. Dr. Cosby has served St. Stephen Church as senior pastor, and the Louisville metropolitan community, since 1979. Under his anointed leadership, the church has grown from 500 to over 10,000 members and has been recognized by Outreach Magazine, as one of the top 100 largest (in 2005) and fastest growing (in 2006) churches in America. In the words of Emerge Magazine, St. Stephen Church is “ One of the six super churches of the South ”. During Dr. Cosby's tenure, the church has helped improve the condition of the surrounding neighborhoods and their resident's lives, by building a 1,500 seat worship center; erecting one of the premier family life centers in the country; purchasing and converting the former only Black owned and operated, Simmons University property into a multi-purpose life enrichment center; establishing transitional housing for recovering addicts, and purchasing and demolishing neighborhood liquor stores and nightclubs. Dr. Cosby also followed God's guidance and led St. Stephen Church into the planting and building of a new church, and 1,000 seat worship/prayer retreat center, in Jeffersonville, Indiana, in the fall of 2004.
Dr. Cosby was recently elected as the 13th President of Simmons College of Kentucky, Louisville, KY. This is the same institution that was started by Elijah Marrs in 1875 as one of the first colleges that accepted African Americans after the Civil War.
Dr. Cosby will receive the Elijah Marrs Achievement Award at the Annual Juneteenth Celebration of the Oldham County History Center on June 16, 2007 from 4 to 6 p.m. . This year's Juneteenth Theme is “The African American Spiritual as Moral Authority”. Dr. Bruce Tyler of the University of Louisville will give a presentation on the topic, followed by musical programs under the direction of the Oldham County Choir and the Pleasant View Baptist Church. Refreshments will follow the program. Admission is free.
