12.19.09
Posted in at 12:07 am by toddsmith
The St. Louis Newspaper Guild has established a writing award in the name of Terry Hughes. The award is intended to honor a journalist whose writing shows the talent that she displayed.
Terry Hughes was 36 when she died of breast cancer on July 22, 1991. A columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, her writing was clear, witty and descriptive, with a flair for portraying society’s underdogs. Some of her columns chronicled the bouts with cancer that she and others faced. One column was credited with helping persuade the Missouri Legislature to approve a bill forcing insurers to pay for mammograms.
One of the many readers who wrote to the newspaper after her death described her work this way: “Her columns were full of real life stories that touched us all and even changed our way of thinking or even our lives.”
Any journalist in the metropolitan St. Louis area who has written for a daily or weekly newspaper or for a magazine is eligible.
Single articles of extraordinary merit will be considered. Preference will be given to entries of between three and ten articles that display the writer’s range of talent.
Articles must have been published in 2009. There are no formal applications. Anyone may submit a nomination by sending copies of articles to:
The Terry Hughes Award Committee
St. Louis Newspaper Guild
1015 Locust Street
Suite 1040
St. Louis, MO 63101
The deadline for applications is January 15, 2010. The award will be presented at the Newspaper Guild’s annual dinner meeting on January 29, 2010.
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12.10.09
Posted in at 10:18 pm by toddsmith
The following is a letter SPJ has sent demanding that the charges against Post-Dispatch reporter Jake Wagman are dropped. Watch a video of his arrest by clicking here.
Patricia Redington
Office of the County Counselor
41 S. Central Ave.
Clayton, Mo. 63105
Dear Counselor Redington,
The St. Louis Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists is calling
on the St. Louis County counselor¹s office to dismiss charges against
journalist Jake Wagman, who was arrested while covering a news event. Wagman
was charged with allegedly interfering with a police officer.
As a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Mr. Wagman was covering a
demonstration at a public hearing (a forum hosted by Rep. Russ Carnahan) on
public premises (Mehlville School District) when opponents got into a
scuffle.
Wagman, who was wearing his press credentials in plain view, identified
himself as a journalist and complied with earlier requests to move back. It
was only when Wagman questioned why he was asked to leave public premises
that he was threatened with arrest. An officer first claimed the site was
private property, correcting himself only after Wagman pointed out that he
was on public property. Wagman was doing nothing more than exercising his
rights under the First Amendment and defending the public¹s right to know.
Police officers need to ensure their own safety and the safety of those
arrested and any bystanders at a crime scene. However, that does not give an
officer the right to act arbitrarily against a journalist who was merely
doing his job.
Making an arrest is a serious matter. It should be done to protect the
public, not as a means to silence a journalist or to restrict the public¹s
right to know. We formally request that charges against Wagman, a reporter
engaged in a constitutionally protected activity, are dropped.
Sincerely,
Kelsey Volkmann
President
St. Louis Pro Chapter
Society of Professional Journalists
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