Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 9, 1992 TAG: 9202090185
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: E4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE:
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
MONTGOMERY NATIVE WINS AWARD
Montgomery County native Anita Shelburne took home the fifth annual D. Lathan Mims Award for editorial leadership, one of the top awards presented Saturday night at the Virginia Press Association's annual winter meetings.Shelburne is an honors graduate of Radford University with a degree in journalism.
She became editorial page editor of the Charlottesville Daily Progress in 1988 after two years as assistant news editor. She spent five years as a reporter for The News Messenger in Christiansburg and was managing editor of The News Journal in Radford for five years.
The seven-entry Mims field was judged by Gene Owens, former editorial page editor for the Roanoke Times & World-News. Of the winning entry, Owens wrote, "Anita Shelburne brings a lively and gutsy style to her editorial page. Her editorials have the professional touch. She shows a willingness to take on the establishment institutions.
"Her editorials are short and forceful and she leaves you with no doubt at the stand she is taking. She knows how to use sarcasm and irony without overdoing it. She also has that ability - rare among editorial writers - to give the reader, clearly and succinctly, the background needed to understand her arguments."
The Mims Award is named for the late D. Lathan Mims, former editor and general manager of the Daily News-Record of Harrisonburg and an active participant in the Virginia Press Association. He was president of VPA in 1974.
Mims believed that newspapers and their editors should be active, caring parts of the communities they serve. He believed that a newspaper should support those things that make the community a better place to live and oppose things that detract from the quality of life.
The award is made to an individual writer of editorials, signed commentaries or editorial page columns who works for a weekly newspaper of any size or a daily newspaper with circulation of 40,000 or less.