From the Publishers Desk
Fire Engineering Staff Wins Editorial A ward
departments
We were tremendously pleased by the reception we got from our August 1977 issue which featured the series of articles. “Famous Fires and the Lessons Learned.” Many readers wrote in to tell us how much knowledge they had acquired from this issue and how they would apply the lessons to their daily fire department functions—particularly in the area of fire prevention. And a few wrote in that they were making the lessons required reading in their fire technology courses.
The series of articles were staff researched and written by Dick Sylvia, Jim Casey and Dorothy Ferguson, our managing editor, and they represented a considerable effort in time and energy.
We also thought as highly as our readers of this series and subsequently entered it in the 24th annual competition for the Neal Editorial Awards. These awards are sponsored by the American Business Press Association, Inc., and are considered the highest awards in business press journalism.
Awards were based on editorial work published between November 1, 1976 and October 31, 1977. Entries came from three classifications of business publications by size, with five categories of editorial work within each.
A panel of judges, headed by Floyd G. Arpen, professor of journalism at Indiana University, selected the 1977 Neal Awards in January after a two-day meeting.
So it was with considerable pleasure that we were informed, just as we were going to press with this issue, that Fire Engineering had won first prize in Class A, Category 3—best staff-written series of articles appearing in a single issue. Charles S. Mill, president of ABP, in announcing the awards, praised the winners “for their ability to force readers to think, evaluate and come up with viable solutions to today’s problems (in their fields).”
We know that our readers will join us in congratulating our editors for a job well done.
