ABERDEEN – The Fall River County Herald-Star (FRCHS) received a total of six awards in the annual contest sponsored by the South Dakota NewsMedia Association (SDNA), with all of the awards this year coming in photography categories.
Leading the way with a first place award was wildlife photographer Dick Kettlewell, who once again won the Best Photo Series category for his monthly Fall River Rhapsody feature.
Judge’s comments included: “The quality of these photos were exceptional, along with frame up and detail. While I favor ‘people’ for photo features, there is no denying the “reader appeal,” technical quality, composition and editing that set these nature photos a part from the rest of the entries. They were simply stunning and fantastic. Great job.”
Kettlewell has been doing the Fall River Rhapsody photo feature in the Herald-Star since 2018 and has won first place in this contest numerous other times as well.
Reporter/Photographers Charity Maness and Marcus Heerdt also each earned a second place award in photo categories. Maness won her runner-up honor in the Best Spot News Photo category for a shot she took of the 21-gun salute during the Memorial Day program at the State Home.
The judge said, “The angle is good and perfect timing to get the fire coming out of the gun.”
Heerdt won his runner-up honor in the Best Portrait Photo category with a picture of Dr. Chris Jass, Directory of Research at The Mammoth Site of Hot Springs.
“Loved the frame-up of this photo, allowing the reader to see the ‘work behind the man.’ While the reader is drawn to Dr. Jass, one finds themselves looking behind to see his work,” the judge of the category said.
Publisher Brett Nachtigall won three third place photography awards for Best Spot News Photo, Best Portrait Photo and Best Sports Photo.
His Spot News Photo was in conjunction with a story about a driver being arrested for DUI after her car landed on top of a parked truck at an apartment complex in Hot Springs.
“The aerial view captures everything. You were able to get a good photo before the vehicle is removed,” the judge stated.
His Portrait Photo was of former Hot Springs City Administrator Bob Nelson, Jr., standing outside of city hall.
The judge said, “Beautiful way to take a traditional ‘mug shot’ and turn it into an eyeappealing photograph. Love the frame-up with the historic city hall in the background.”
Nachtigall’s Sports Photo was a shot of the crowd inside Case Auditorium after Josh Kleinsasser sunk a three-point basket versus Custer during the 2024 boys basketball season.
This year’s SDNA contest marked a change in the various divisions. With the addition of some non-newspaper media outlets, like 605 Sports and South Dakota Searchlight, now being able to enter the contest, divisions are no longer based on circulation but rather the population of the city where the print or online publication is produced.
Division 1 is for cities under 3,000; Division 2 is for cities 3,000 to 15,000; and Division 3 is for cities over 15,000. The Fall River County Herald-Star competed in Division 2.
The Black Hills was represented well in this year’s 2024 SDNA contest as the Hill City Prevailer won the General Excellence Award for Division 1, and the Custer County Chronicle won the Sweepstakes Award for Division 2 after garnering the most points through awards won in the various categories.
Last year, the Fall River County Herald-Star won the 2023 General Excellence Award for its circulation division.