The Wimberley View took home six statewide awards, including first place in General Excellence in its division, at the annual Texas Press Association conference held in San Marcos this weekend.
“I’m really proud of our entire team, because winning the General Excellence category, by its very nature, shows quality in every aspect of the newspaper,” Dalton Sweat, general manager and editor of the Wimberley View said. “Beyond General Excellence, these other awards were won by some of our former writers like Gary Zupancic, showing his storytelling and photography abilities even as he was on his way to retirement. But, it also shows the type of talent we have brought in as two of our newest writers, Madi Telschow and Colton McWilliams, were part of award submissions.”
General Excellence winners are chosen based on their news coverage, quality of writing, composition/display, headlines, use of photos and art work, front page and specialty pages such as editorial, family life, social and sports pages.
Texas Press Association’s annual Better Newspaper Contest featured 18 categories this year. Work produced from September 2020 through December 2021 was eligible.
The View was also awarded first place in News Writing for two submissions written by Sweat. The View submitted “First Flush,” published July 29, 2021 about the completion of the city’s sewer system as well as “When the well stops flowing,” published January 28, 2021 about what happens when Jacob’s Well dries up.
The headlines “Bar Fight Breaks Out Over Proposed Development,” “First Flush” and “‘Cat Clings to Climbing Way Crossing” were good enough to win second place in Headline Writing.
Coverage of multiple state championships on the same weekend in golf and tennis coupled with the breadth of coverage of multiple sports helped win third place in Sports Coverage and a conglomeration of five photos placed the View in fourth in News Photography.
The Wimberley Visitor’s Guide was fourth place in Best Magazine, which is not broken up into divisions and is instead a single category across all weekly newspapers in the state.
