Molly Ivins. We miss her so. Although there are abundant reasons to be fearful about the condition of journalism in the United States today, there are also, as we try to demonstrate in each issue of The Texas Observer, reasons to be hopeful.
Molly and hope are the reasons that the Observer and its publisher, the nonprofit Texas Democracy Foundation, established the MOLLY National Journalism Prize. The prize recognizes print or online journalism of exceptional merit that tells stories that need telling, challenges conventional wisdom, focuses on civil liberties or social justice, and embodies the intelligence, deep thinking, and passionate wit that marked Molly’s work.
The inaugural prizes were awarded June 12 in Austin.
We had numerous nominations, including some astoundingly good reporting and writing. The competition was stiff, but our MOLLY Board of Advisers, composed of professional journalists and scholars from around the nation, reviewed and critiqued them all to give us a winner and two honorable mentions.
The winners represent newspapers and magazines, mainstream and alternative. Molly would have been tickled that all three winners were women. The terrific reporters honored here exemplify what is good and promising about journalism in our country.
This competition for the MOLLY helps demonstrate that great journalism, in the tradition of Molly Ivins, is still alive in America. We hope it will inspire more.
Molly would be proud.
