“Love and concern for comunity is ovious.”
That was a judge from the Tennessee Press Association’s assessment of a first-place statewide-winning editorial by The Roc k d a l e Reporter.
our newspaper earned second in the state in sweepstakes (all categories combined) competition in the 2018-2019 Texas Press Association contest.
In addition to editorials, The Reporter also won first places in news photography and “Blue Moon” special sections. A “Blue Moon” section is anything themed for a subject which rarely happens. The Reporter’s recalled the Tigers’ 201: state championship football season.
The Reporter also won second place in sports coverage, third in feature stories, third in headline writing and fourth in news writing.
Awards were handed out Saturday at the TPA’s annual Midwinter Conference and Trade Show at Moody Gardens in Galveston and were accepted by Publishers en Cooke and Christine Granados.
PHOTOS—The Reporter’ s news photography first place included a special honor. Editor Mike Brown’s photo of a Rockdale YFD water rescue from Brushy Creek flooding was one of five selected to appear on the cover of the W in n er’s C ir le, a TPA publication listing all the awards bestowed at the convention.
Those photos were selected from the 108 publications entering the statewide contest, representing all divisions, dailies, semi-weeklies and weeklies.
The Reporter entered five photos (req uired), all by Brown.
I n addition to the cover photo, another Reporter entry—RVFD volunteers battling a fire—was published inside the W in n er’s C ir le.
The other photos comprising the winning entry were of silhouetted workers on police station construction, laying turf on the new Tiger Stadium field and San Gabriel tornado damage.
Judge’s comment:
s eri es of photos c a ptu red a t d ifferen t a n g les. G ood w ork .”
LAST CONTEST— Both editorials—one on The Reporter breaking the news of Bitmain coming to the former Alcoa smelter and one on the financial plight of Little River-Rockdale Hospital—were written by Brown.
Judge’s comment: “Powerful local editorials. W ell
rtte th a tro oe and clearly outlined argum ents. Love and concern for com m u n ity is o v io s.”
This marks the final statewide press competition for the veteran newspaperman, who will retire this fall after a 4 6-year career, all with The Reporter.
He ends with eight statewide first-places, including wins in all four individual news writing categories bestowed by the TPA, editorials, news writing, columns and feature stories.
Brown won the editorial division four times.
TIGER FIGHT—“Tiger Fight Never Dies,” The Reporter’ s first-place winning entry in the Blue Moon pecial ection was a game-by-game chronicle of that magical 2017 season which saw Big Blue shake off losses in two of its first three games and march to the state championship, won at AT T S tadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys.
Compiled and edited by former Reporter S ports Editor Bill Martin, it was illustrated with game photos from that magical season.
Judge’s comment: re t o hro o e
b lu e m oo s ea s o ru n to the top. The u se o sev era l stori es to tel l the s tory of the team’s jorney was a good c hoc e. E x c elen t photo a n d pla cem en t. A w in n er in a to g h c a teg ory .”
SPORTS— S ports Editor W ynton Thomason’s second-place winning sports entry consisted of sports pages from Nov. 24 , 2018 (football, basketball) and Jan. 24 , 2019 (basketball, golf, soccer and Thomason’s column on cancer survivor Gunner Miller).
Judge’s comment: “BOLD u s e of lea d pa g e photos , com plem entary graphics and varie fot. Nice atteto to det t n ot lim ited to ev en t s ta ts ‘T le of the Tpe’ a n d ev en fishing report!”
COMMENTS—Here are judge’s comments from other categories in which The Reporter placed:
e ture w ritin t ird p la ce (B ro n: T o oo s tories here O n e a n ex c el-et oo t o o
to ter th c h hoo abandoment and the oth er a warm and wel-written look a t a w om a n w ho foll ow ed i n her f a ther’s f oot s teps .”
H ea dl ines, th ird p l a ce (Brown): “ G oo u s e o popular reerences.”
e s ritin ourt place (Brown): “ e B row n brin gs exten sive d eta i l to hi s reports , rel y - in g on w itn esses, officia l report h tore to te com pellin g stories a b ou t a pow erf u l s torm tha t pu m - meled the community and the pro res s o a c ry ptoc u r re operto et to ope and crete does o loca l job s. B row n efectively uses subheads to transito et ee eto o h reporting and provide an eete a e to foo road m apor readers.”
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