UNT's Mayborn Conference announces winners of newspaper narrative contest

Thursday, July 14, 2016 - 14:55
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DENTON (UNT), Texas -- "An American Void" by Washington Post national reporter Stephanie McCrummen took the top prize at the 2016 Best American Newspaper Narrative Writing Contest sponsored by the University of North Texas' Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference.

The story, published in September 2015, focused on the friends of the alleged murderer of nine members of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, North Carolina, last year. McCrummen interviewed and followed the friends over several weeks to produce the story.

Co-sponsored by the Dallas Morning News, the Best American Newspaper Narrative Writing Contest began in 2013 as a way for the Mayborn Literary Nonfiction Conference to honor published work and to encourage narrative nonfiction storytelling at U.S. newspapers. Long-form narratives published during 2015 were eligible for the 2016 competition.

In addition to selecting first-, second- and third-place winners, contest judges also choose runners-up entries and "notable narrative" entries, and all are published in a print and e-book anthology, "The Best American Newspaper Narratives." The anthology that includes entries recognized in the 2015 contest is available from UNT Press.

As the first-place winner, McCrummen receives $5,000. She previously received $1,000 for placing third in the 2015 contest.

For the second straight year, Los Angeles Times general assignment reporter Christopher Goffard received the second place award of $2,000 for "Fleeing Syria -- A Mother's Wrenching Choice." Part of the Times' "Fleeing Syria" series and published in September 2015, the story focused on a former dressmaker from the Syrian town of Aleppo who had hitched passage with a smuggler to gain asylum for her family in Sweden. Her husband and children had not joined her after a year and a half, and were in Turkey. Goffard interviewed both the woman in Ljusdaj, Sweden, and the rest of her family in Istanbul.

The third-place prize of $1,000 was awarded to Sarah Schweitzer of the Boston Globe for "The Life and Times of Strider Wolf." Schweitzer documented the difficult life of a 6-year-boy and his brother, who were rescued from near-fatal abuse and sent to live with their grandparents. The grandparents faced financial hardship and lived in campgrounds in Maine as they cared for the boys. Schweitzer was a runner up in the 2015 Best American Newspaper Narrative Writing Contest.

The 2016 runners up are:

  • Cynthia Hubert of the Sacramento Bee for "Genny's World"
  • Mark Johnson of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for "Patient, Surgeon Work Together"
  • Michael M. Phillips of the Wall Street Journal for "Taken Hostage"

The 2016 notable narrative winners are:

  • Gina Barton of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for "Unsolved: A Murdered Teen, a 40-year Mystery"
  • John Woodrow Cox of the Washington Post for "Telling JJ"
  • Maria Cramer of the Boston Globe for "The Boy Who Burned Inside"
  • Howard Reich of the Chicago Tribune for "Norman Malone's Quest"

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