Newspaper brings home 13 SCPA awards, five first places

The News & Reporter took home 13 awards, including five first place awards, in the latest S.C. Press Association annual competition, with some staff members showing continued excellence in a couple of areas.
Sports Editor Travis Jenkins took home the first place award for writing the best sports columns for the third consecutive year.
"That's an actual hat trick, scoring three consecutive 'goals' like that," said Editor Stephen Guilfoyle of Jenkins' award. "It's the top prize for sports writers, so he's been the best at what he does for three years running now."
That competition was for papers that come out two and three times a week.
The judge said of his entry, "Nice tribute column to a lady who volunteered to send in race results. Feature column on singing fans made me smile, and writer offered a good opinion piece on the Bulldogs."
Guilfoyle won the Harris Award for Editorial Writing. In that competition, he went up against all the non-daily newspapers in the state.
It is the fifth time he's won the award in his career and the third time since joining The N&R in 2004.
"This newspaper does exactly what it should -- take stands on local issues in thoughtful, well-written editorials that make good cases for newspaper’s positions," the judge wrote.
The editorials considered were, "Picking on the poor," about Gov. Mark Sanford; "Should he have mentioned it?" about former Superintendent Larry Heath; and "County wrong to threaten to sue," about the county threatening to sue county residents during the Fort Lawn situation.
Guilfoyle also won first place in Profile Feature Writing or Story for 2/3 Times weekly newspaper for "Reserved Seating: Friends remember longtime officer," a story on community reaction to the death of longtime Chester Police Lt. Tommy Harrison.
The judge said, "Powerful, well-written story that leaves an impact with readers."
Guilfoyle also won a first place award for Page One Design at 2/3 Times a week papers.
"Nice use of graphics, photos and other elements," the judge wrote. "Designer has a gift for packaging lead story.
He also won the first and second place awards for Enterprise Reporting at 2/3 Times a week newspapers.
The first place award was for the story "'08 Brazil trip filled with work," on an economic development trip to Brazil.
"Interesting probe," the judge wrote of that story.
The second place award was for "$500 million incinerator," in which The N&R broke the news of the Covanta Energy project.
Jenkins also won second place awards for:
• Sports Enterprise Reporting, also an All-Weekly award, for coverage of where to play high school football's weekend of champions;
• News Headline Writing at 2/3 a week papers, and
• Spot Sports Story writing at Weekly 2/3 Times for "Downey raises the roof";
as well as third place awards for Sports Action Photo and Sports Feature Photo.
Great Falls Editor Nancy Parsons won a third place award for Lifestyle Feature Writing at 2/3 Times a week papers for "Eli touches bases and hearts."
She, Guilfoyle and Jenkins shared a second place award for Reporting In-Depth at 2/3 times a week papers for coverage of the school consolidation issue.
In all, Jenkins won seven awards, Guilfoyle won six, with Parsons getting two, including the shared award.
Jenkins' seven total awards were the most won by any journalist in the non-daily ranks.
"One thing the awards show is that we have to do a lot of different things each week at The News & Reporter," Guilfoyle said. "Travis excels at sports writing, but he also pitched in and wrote some news headlines, and those turned out to be award winners. He has always been an excellent photographer. Nancy won not just for a feature in her beloved beat of Great Falls, but also for working with the team to cover the county-wide news story that consolidation became."
"Being recognized by your peers is always good," said Publisher Buddy Aultman. "But when the economy creates an understaffed situation like we have at The News & Reporter, the awards mean even more. In recent years, we have had fewer people doing more and yet we managed to have a good 2009. The editorial awards are like icing on the cake."
In the past three years, Jenkins has won five first place awards and 17 total awards, making him one of the most honored journalists in the state.
In the past three years, Guilfoyle has won eight first place awards and 13 total awards.
In the past three years, Parsons has won five awards, including one first place.
The paper has won 68 awards in SCPA contests since 2005.
Two of The N&R's sister papers in South Carolina also won awards. The Lancaster News won seven awards including two first place awards. The Pageland Progressive-Journal won one.

What she saw on Good Friday

My wife just pasted this on Facebook:
Patricia Larson Guilfoyle: Just saw someone playing Jesus walking down Hwy. 160 in Fort Mill. it's Good Friday, all right!
I, being a smart ass, had a reply at the ready: How do you know it was someone playing Jesus? Could it have been ... Himself?

Remember what happened when the Irish priest got through to the Vatican, told the Pope, "I'm not crazy, but the Lord Jesus himself has returned and he's walking down the main street. Tell me what to DO!"
And the Pope says, "Look busy."

By the way. I like Jesus' sneakers.