Saturday 23 May 2009

Abel's NNA win

Toronto Sun photographer Dave Abel was disappointed when Quebecor axed the 2008 Dunlop Awards, but was all smiles last night when he heard his dramatic bank robbery takedown won a National Newspaper Award.

We're not sure if Abel paid his own way to Montreal because of the Quebecor ban on awards expenses or sat it out in T.O., but fellow photojournalists and readers generally agreed his amazing February 2008 News Photography non was the one to beat.

The Canadian Press has all of the details from the 60th annual NNA awards gala in Montreal, which saw the Globe and Mail dominating the wins with six of the 22 awards and again provides links to winning entries in its NNA story.

The Toronto Star was next with four, followed by Montreal's La Presse and the Hamilton Spectator with two each, says the CP story.

The Canadian Press, Toronto Sun, Calgary Herald, London Free Press, Montreal Gazette, Lethbridge Herald, Simcoe Reformer and Ottawa Citizen had one each.

Once again petty corporate Quebecor/Sun Media will take the spotlight in announcing major awards while refusing to tell readers nominees have to foot all of their expenses if they want to attend awards ceremonies.

But well done, Dave, and congrats to all of the other winners.

(NNA noms list can be viewed here re links to most entries.)

4 comments:

  1. I take it that the current management will not be matching Dave's NNA award money, a tradition I started at the Sun after winning the spot news photo in 1979. I'm proud of the fact that it was the first NNA win in that category for the paper!

    At that point, there was no matching policy, something the Star and Globe were already doing.

    Bill Sandford

    ReplyDelete
  2. Abel was there -- ALL the Sun Media nominees were. Read the Sun, page 3.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Another year another nom/win for the lil' Simcoe daily. An excellent reminder to the masters that smaller market newspapers and local journalism still matters.... no matter how much you keep chopping them off at the knees

    ReplyDelete
  4. Abel!!!! A well deserved win and thank you for representing the Sun in such class. You are what we once were!

    ReplyDelete