Blade outdoors editor gets 5 top awards

Markey, Basting grab outstanding media achievement honor

5/7/2013

Blade outdoors editor Matt Markey captured five top awards in the Outdoor Writers of Ohio competition when the contest winners were announced at the group’s annual convention held recently on South Bass Island.

Mr. Markey was selected for first-place awards for best newspaper columnist; best newspaper article for “Ohio hunters trek over onetime Shawnee land”; best newspaper special section or series for a series of stories on the ecology and threatened ecosystem in the Everglades, and best environmental writing for an in-depth piece on how the destructive emerald ash borer presents a threat to the baseball bat industry.

Mr. Markey and Blade artist Jeff Basting captured the outstanding media achievement award for excellence in outdoors communications for “The Outdoors Page,” a magazine-style creation that appears each month in The Blade.

Six different outdoors pages that were published in 2012 made up their entry.

The judges for this year’s contest included members of the Michigan Outdoor Writers Association.