By Staff
Leader Publications received eight awards and two honorable mentions from the annual Michigan Press Association "Newspaper of the Year" awards.
The awards were released Oct. 1 in conjunction with National Newspaper Week.
Topping the list was Kelly Sweeney, sports photographer, who was awarded both first and second place in the Weekly Sports Picture category for photos that appeared in the Edwardsburg Argus and the Cassopolis Vigilant.
The Argus also received a second place award for sports coverage, a third place award for its editorial page, and Marcia Steffens, managing editor for the Argus, received an honorable mention for her weekly column.
Steffens also received a third-place award for her picture story entitled "Memorial Day to remember," which appeared in the Cassopolis Vigilant. The Vigilant was also awarded third place for its design.
Scott Novak, sports editor for the Dowagiac Daily News, was awarded second place for his weekly sports column, and the Daily News received an honorable mention for its editorial page.
Leader Publications received a first place award for best ad series for its series promoting Brandywine schools.
In the annual contest, 4,115 entries were submitted by 138 newspapers from throughout Michigan. Entries were judged by members of the Illinois Press Association. Awards were broken down by circulation class, with Leader Publications newspapers falling into either the Daily Class D category, for daily newspapers with circulation under 15,001, or Weekly Class D, for weekly newspapers with circulation under 4,001.
The daily newspapers of the year were the Detroit Free Press in Class A, the Flint Journal in Class B, the Jackson Citizen Patriot for Class C and the Livingston County Daily Press &Argus for Class D. The top weekly newspapers were the Southgate News-Herald, the Detroit Jewish News, the Northville Record and the State Line Observer.