Daily Herald receives 8 awards from Illinois Associated Press
The Daily Herald accepted eight awards of excellence Thursday night in the 2010 Illinois Associated Press Editors Association Editorial Excellence contest.
The honors included three first-place awards, including one for Daily Herald columnist Burt Constable in the features category for his story about Rob Komosa's life 10 years after he was paralyzed in a high-school football accident in Rolling Meadows.
"This was an important follow up to the story about the life of an athlete," judges said. "Sensitively written and reported and full of rich detail."
The newspaper received two first-place awards for photography - both by photographer John Starks. He won in the general news category for his photo of a welcome-home event in Algonquin for Master Sgt. Matt Harman of the National Guard after a year in Afghanistan.
Judges simply declared, "Amazing photograph."
And Starks won in the pictorial category for his image titled Light Road, showing a pedestrian and traffic on a damp evening in St. Charles.
Judges said Stark's photo was "very surreal with excellent use of light and composition."
Politics and Projects Editor Joseph Ryan and Transportation Writer Marni Pyke won second place in investigative reporting for their series about red-light cameras. The project, called Seeing Red, showed that red-light cameras were being used to target relatively minor infractions and sometimes at intersections without safety issues.
A story called Heroin's Heartache brought staff writer Jamie Sotonoff a second place award. Her story was about a group of suburban teenagers whose lives were destroyed by heroin.
Photographer George LeClaire won third place in the pictorial category for his image called Torenia, of the inside of a torenia flower.
And photographer Steve Lundy won third place in sports action for his photo called Point Blank Save. It showed Antioch soccer goalie Alex Grimm making a diving save at point-blank range during a game at Lake Zurich High School.
The newspaper also won third place for general excellence. The awards were given out at a banquet in Springfield Thursday night.
Daily Herald photographers also was lauded for their work in another recent statewide contest.
The Illinois Press Photographers Association gave John Starks a third-place honor in the Nature and Environment category for his photo called "Drop It" of a drop of water. Photographer George LeClaire won an honorable mention for "Nature of Hearts," a photo of a heart shape found in nature.
The awards were given out at the organization's annual convention in St. Louis last week.