Lifetime Achievement Award Recipients

Once overseen by SPJ National and now given out by the Central Ohio chapter, this award honors individuals who have demonstrated a lifetime contribution to the journalism profession.

2026 – Ann B. Walker, for her trailblazing career in journalism (posthumous); Kent Cahlander, Gongwer News Service; Jim Provance, The Toledo Blade

2025 – Mark Williams, The Columbus Dispatch; Don DeParro, Columbus Business First; Angela Pace, WBNS-10TV; Lee Leonard, The Columbus Dispatch

2024 – Emily Foster, Columbus Monthly; Clay Hall, ABC6; Mary Yost, The Columbus Dispatch

2023 – Ann Fisher, WOSU News; Ray Paprocki, Dispatch Magazines, Tino Ramos, 10TV; Lu Ann Stoia, ABC6; Andrew Welsh-Huggins, Associated Press

2022 – Alan Miller, John Futty & Darrel Rowland, The Columbus Dispatch

2021 – Joe McKnight, Associated Press; Ray Stein & Randy Ludlow, The Columbus Dispatch; Duane St. Clair, CityScene; Paul Kostyu, retired journalism professor at Ohio Wesleyan University

2019 – Chris Bradley, WBNS-10 (posthumous); Richard W. Carson, Barbara James; Gary Kiefer, Mary Beth Lane and Tim May, The Columbus Dispatch; Eric Lyttle, Columbus Monthly.