The Maries County Advocate received 26 awards Saturday in the Missouri Press Association’s 2018 Better Newspaper Contest for work produced in 2017.

Awards were presented during the association’s 152nd annual convention held in St. Louis, Mo.

Of the 26 awards, seven where for first place, seven were second-place awards, 10 were third-place awards and there were two honorable mention awards.

The Advocate was awarded second place in the General Excellence and Overall Design categories among class 1 weekly publications based on circulation. The three editions comprising the entry included reporting and photography by Roxie Murphy, Laura Schiermeier, Jacob and Dennis Warden, and Dave Marner.

Entries in this category include all aspects of the newspaper including advertising and public notices. The Advocate’s entry included production work by  Jacob Warden Christine Yearwood and Tammy Curtis. Kari Schweer is office manager for the publication.

The Advocate’s staff was awarded first place in the Community Service category for the expanded coverage of the wildfire assistance heading to Kansas. 

“The community reached out to help others and the paper jumped right on board with this — from multiple stories, editorials, photos, and advertising,” according to the judge.

The Visitation Sesquicentennial Celebration earned a second-place award for the staff.

Coverage of the total solar eclipse, overall front page design, multi-media reporting on the Kansas convoy, and overall sports pages each received third-place awards. 

The judge said “strong photos of a lot of players really set this paper apart. Great work! You are truly the place for sports news in Maries County.”

The Advocate’s editorial pages rounded out the staff awards with an honorable mention.

Roxie Murphy received first-place honors in Best Business Story for coverage of the ABC Store following its destruction by fire.

“This in-depth story does a great job documenting what was a pillar in a small-town community. The story has two sides — the timely hard-news element with the fire, and the emotional, feature story of the business. The quotes are strong and bring Terry and Doris Abel to life,” wrote the judge.

Murphy also won first-place awards for Best Feature Photograph,  Coverage of Government, Best Story About History and Best Story About the Outdoors.

Jacob Warden and Murphy received first place in Best Story About Rural Life or Agriculture for their joint coverage of the convoy that delivered relief to the Kansas wildfire victims.

“While other entries covered local responses to the wildfire outbreak in Kansas, this newspaper blows them away with the extensiveness of its reporting. Plenty of photos and interviews back that up,” said the judge.

Warden received awards for first place in Best Sports Feature Photographs; second in Best Sports Photograph, Best Photo Package and third in Best Sport Photograph.

Laura Schiermeier was awarded a third place and honorable mention in the Best Story About Religion category for her coverage leading up to Visitation’s sesquicentennial celebration. 

The judge called the stories a “colorful, insightful, and enjoyable to read. Fine use of ‘then’ and ‘now’ perspectives and nice balance of quotes and background information.” 

Schiermeier also placed third in the categorizes for Best Military Story (honor flight), Breaking News Story (tornado at Freeburg), and Best Story About Education (Eagles video).

Dennis Warden, owner and publisher of The Maries County Advocate, received a second-place award for the illustration on the front of Visitation’s sesquicentennial special section and a second-place award for his column “A New Adventure.”

The Advocate’s sister paper The Gasconade County Republican earned two first-place awards, three third-place awards and four honorable mentions among class 2 weekly publications.