At the Arizona Newspapers Association convention on Saturday, Oct. 6, Larson Newspapers walked away with six awards in the Excellence in Advertising contest and 14 journalism awards in the Better Newspapers Contest.
Larson Newspapers General Manager Kyle Larson and the Production Department won second place in Best Pro Bono/Public Service Ad for the city of Sedona Wet Fest ad in the Sedona Red Rock News.
The NEWS won second place in Best Color Ad for advertising executive Derek Chase’s ad “Sedona Digs: Guests are Coming” while advertising executive Becky Morey won third place in Best Paid Ad Series — Black & White for Mexidona Fine Mexican Imports.
The NEWS’ sales staff won third in Best Newspaper Promotion Ad, Series or Section for the Sedona Fire District’s 60th anniversary special section.
On the editorial side, the NEWS won first place for Editorial Page Excellence and Best Use of Photography.
Managing Editor Christopher Fox Graham won first place in Best Column, Feature Or Criticism for his rhyming editorial “When Seuss day comes ’round, find city library-bound.”
The NEWS won second place in Headline Writing for Makenna Lepokski’s “Opportuni-trees” and other headlines, and second for Best Team, Sport or Sports Beat Coverage for Daniel Hargis’ coverage of Sedona Red Rock High School basketball.
The NEWS won first in Best News Photograph for Jake Green’s “Bikes, Beers & Batman at annual race” second and third in Best Feature Photograph for Green’s “Let There Be Light” Santa photograph and “I Saw the Sign,” respectively.
The NEWS competes in Division 2, non-daily newspapers with circulation between 3,500 and 10,000.
The NEWS’ sister newspaper, The Camp Verde Journal, competes in Division 1, non-daily newspapers with circulation under 3,500.
The JOURNAL’s advertising executive Robert Schmierer and graphic designer Jan Marc Quisumbing won first place in Best Paid Ad Series — Color for the Haunted Group’s Summer ad series. The JOURNAL also took second place for Best Classified Section.
On the editorial side, the JOURNAL took two third-place awards for Editorial Page Excellence and Best Use of Photography.
The JOURNAL also won first place in Best Sports Photograph for Hunt Mercier’s “Barreling Through,” second place in Best News Photograph for Mercier’s “One World, One People,” and third place in Best Feature Photograph for Mercier’s “Tights And Frights.”
A number of other journalism awards were also presented at the convention. SRRHS’s former student-run newspaper The Sting and journalism teacher Maureen Barton won General Excellence in the Scholastic Division. The NEWS printed The Sting for the school.
Randy Wilson, the editor of the Arizona Daily Sun, who died suddenly in July, was posthumously awarded a Silver Key from the Society of Professional Journalists and Journalist of the Year from the Associated Press.
Overall, the Navajo Times won non-daily Newspaper of the Year, while the Arizona Republic won daily Newspaper of the Year.
ANA was established in 1930, the successor to the Arizona Press Association of 1905 and the Arizona Daily Newspaper Association of 1922. The ANA is a nonprofit trade association representing more than 115 Arizona newspapers, governed by an 11-member board of directors elected by the member newspapers.
