The Jewish Exponent won six Keystone Press Awards in the 2017 competition, including two first-place honors.
The Exponent competed against other weekly newspapers throughout Pennsylvania with a circulation of 10,000 or more.
News Editor Liz Spikol took first-place honors in the “feature story” category with the June 30 story “Tattoo This: The Jewish Body Is No Longer Off Limits,” which explored increasing numbers of Jews being tattooed.
Spikol also won second-place honors in the “series” category for “Jewish Life in Vermont, Parts I and II,” which ran Sept. 29 and Oct. 6. The stories profiled Jews living in an unlikely location.
Staff writer Marissa Stern won first-place honors in the “personality profile” category for a Sept. 22 story titled “Mother Turns Sadness Into Advocacy,” about Cindy Singer and her son Dylan’s battle with familial dysautonomia (FD).
Stern also received honorable mention honors in the “general news” category for “Local Veteran’s Photos Headed to Library of Congress After Years of Collecting Dust,” which appeared Dec. 22. The story profiled Milton Dienes, whose squadron photographed Hiroshima and Nagasaki after atomic bombs were dropped during World War II.
Editor-in-Chief Joshua Runyan placed second in the “editorial” category based on three editorials: “Not In the Olympic Spirit” on Aug. 11, “The Need to Move Forward” on Nov. 17 and “An Epidemic of Hopelessness” on Dec. 15.
Runyan also received honorable mention honors in the “column” category for “Hermine, Eagles, Politics Point to the Folly of Predictions” on Sept. 8, “We Need to Talk” on Nov. 17 and “Baseless Attacks and Ridiculous Defenses” on Nov. 24.
The winners will be honored May 20 at the Keystone Press Awards Banquet in Harrisburg.
Liz Spikol’s dad Art was just as GREAT a writer as his very multi-talented lovely WORDSMITH daughter. What a journalistic dynasty they are blessed with! Being a Pathmark supermarket alumnus, I cried when I read Liz’s piece on Brown’s Fresh Grocer of Monument Road. I was at that PM Grand Opening in October, 1979, and am so grateful the Brown family brought my beloved City Line Pathmark, which was destroyed by A&P/Superfresh, back to life. What a MITVAH, Liz!