In a field of tough competitors, Polk County Publishing Company (PCPC) brought home 18 awards from the 2024 Better Newspaper Contest during the 145th annual Texas Press Association (TPA) Convention & Trade Show held June 19-21 at the Embassy Suites by Hilton Denton Convention Center.
Competitors were divided into divisions in which newspapers competed against publications of similar circulation. The entries were judged by members of the Kansas Press Association.
Publisher Kelli Barnes; advertising director Ashley Keenan; Polk County Enterprise managing editor Emily Banks Wooten and Tony Farkas, editor of the Trinity County
News-Standard and the San Jacinto News-Times, attended the convention and trade show, participating in numerous informative sessions on current industry topics.
The Tyler County Booster won first place for advertising, first place for sports photography, second place for general excellence, second place for page design, third place for feature photography, third place for sports coverage and third place sweepstakes in its division.
The advertising category netted Booster design editor Beth Faircloth an award for a trio of ads, which judges stated “Each ad was like a piece of art.”
Booster reporter and photographer Becki Byrd earned a first-place award for her sports photography, and an image of Chester Yellowjacket Wayne Sturrock on the pitcher’s mound was spotlighted by judges. Comments about the photos included “Every photo is BOOM!”
For the page design category, a trio of page design samples that included the Booster’s front-page coverage of the Woodville Eagles’ bid at a state championship in 2024 as well as samples of an opinion page and a sports page were entered. Both Faircloth and Booster editor Chris Edwards were credited, and judges commented that the newspaper’s design is “consistent and easy to follow,” and that the front-page entry looked “great with the football photos.”
For the third-place sports coverage, the Booster’s use of photos and range of coverage was noted. Edwards, Booster reporter/photographer Mollie La Salle and advertising representative and frequent features photographer Donna Hammer all won for the feature photo category for entries they’d shot in 2024.
Faircloth was also awarded for her work on the quarterly East Texan magazine, as it won a third-place award for page design. She shared the honor with Cheryl Lloyd and Amanda Barker-Besch for the magazine’s summer 2024 issue.
The Polk County Enterprise earned first place honors for news photography and sports coverage, second place honors for community service, third place honors for page design and best magazine, and fourth place honors for editorial writing and general excellence.
The first place for news photography is for a collection of five photographs taken by Wooten and Brian Besch and the first place for sports coverage is for work done by Besch and Albert Trevino.
Other newspapers owned by Polk County Publishing Company that placed in the contest are the San Jacinto News-Times and the Trinity County News-Standard.
The San Jacinto News-Times won first place for page design, second place for headline writing and fourth place for column writing. The Trinity County News-Standard won second place for page design.
During the TPA annual business meeting, PCPC Publisher Kelli Barnes, an elected TPA director, was elected to serve as treasurer on the TPA Board of Directors for the upcoming year.
Laurie Ezzell Brown of The Canadian Record was inducted into the Texas Newspaper Hall of Fame for exemplary service to her community and to the Texas newspaper industry. Brown gained national recognition as publisher of The Canadian Record and her fight to stave off a news desert in her rural Panhandle community. The second generation to run her family newspaper, she joins her father, the late Ben R. Ezzell, who was inducted with the Hall of Fame Class of 2009.
Five people were honored with TPA’s Golden 50 Award which honors men and women who have displayed exemplary service and selfless contributions to journalism for 50 or more years. Those five are Ruthanne Brockway of Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Rick Craig of Nacogdoches Daily Sentinel, Robert Cessna of the Bryan Eagle, Clyde King of Fort Bend Herald and Candace Velvin of Texas Press Association.
Next year’s convention and trade show is slated for June 18-20 at the Hyatt Regency DFW Airport.
