Windspeaker continues its winning ways

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Windspeaker continued its winning tradition, sweeping up many of the awards up for grabs at the annual convention of the Native American Press Association.

The sixth annual convention held on the coast of Washington state in Fife, south of Seattle, honored the best of Indian country's newspapers and journalists in the United States and Canada.

Windspeaker's winning ways at the association's sixth annual convention left many people asking "Where's Edmonton?"

Windspeaker General Manager Bert Crowfoot said he was pleased with the awards won by Windspeaker.

"The awards are the result of a lot of hard work by Windspeaker staff and I'm proud of them. We have an excellent staff, who are always willing to go that little extra to produce a better product. Without their dedication and hard work all of this wouldn't be possible." He also added "I would also commend the other publications in Indian country, because I have seen them improve immensely since our first entry six years ago. We used to walk away with a majority of the awards in past competitions but this year we came in second in five categories. That just goes to show you the other publications are getting better. We'll have to work harder to stay ahead. There are some excellent publications out there and these competitions are great for setting the standard for future years."

Windspeaker took one award in seven of the eight categories, grabbing about one-third of the 24 awards it was eligible for.

A first place award was given for the special feature article "Conspiracy of Silence: Child abuse and incest often a family secret" (March 17, 1989), which was written by Elaine O'Farrell.

An editorial written by Dana Wagg, entitled "The system failed," which dealt with the inquiry report by Judge Michael Porter on the suicide of Wayne Moberly (Jan 26, 1989) was also given a first place award.

A Nov 10, 1989 story by Wagg on the suicide of Wayne's brother, Larry, received the second place award in the news writing category.

And Windspeaker Staff Writer Jeff Morrow took a second place award for his column Feb. 9, 1990 on the royal commission report into the wrongful imprisonment of Donald Marshall.

Keith Matthew's story of 34-year-old Cliff Gunpowder and his dream of fighting for the Canadian middleweight crown caught the eye of the judges, who awarded him second place honors for sports reporting.

Windspeaker also took two other second place awards general excellence (weekly) and best typography and design.