Former NNA president, publisher of small, rural weekly win organization's top service awards

Chip Hutcheson

A recently retired editor-publisher who is becoming a minister, and one who has shown how outstanding journalism can be done in a small, rural county, received the top lifetime honors at the National Newspaper Association's annual convention in Tulsa this morning.

John S. "Chip" Hutcheson of Princeton, Ky., won the James O. Amos Award, given to men, and Anne Adams of The Recorder in Monterey, Va., won the Emma C. McKinney Award, given to women, for distinguished service and leadership to the community press and their communities. Adams was unable to attend, but gave thanks by video and promised to attend next year's convention in Norfolk; Hutcheson's acceptance speech was at times sermonesque, and both were well received.

Hutcheson retired this year as publisher of The Times Leader of Princeton and The Eagle Post of Oak Grove, Ky., both owned by the Kentucky New Era of Hopkinsville. He also oversaw another New Era property, the Dawson Springs Progress. He was president of the Kentucky Press Association in 2010, entered the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame in 2012, and was president of NNA in 2015-16. Perhaps most remarkably, he was president of the Kentucky Baptist Convention in 2013-14, only the sixth layman of 75 people who have held the position.

Anne Adams

Hutcheson referred to the story in Chapter 5 of the Acts of the Apostles, about believers wanting to merely touch the shadow of Peter to be healed. He told the crowd that many shadows have touched his life and helped him, and "Your shadow has probably impacted many more people than you would imagine. . . . We have such an opportunity to impact lives."

Adams had been general manager of The Recorder for many years when she bought the small weekly in 2007. "I was afraid if Lee [Campbell] had sold it to someone else, I might have been laid off," she said, adding that she didn't have credit for the purchase, but five local people co-signed the loan -- even after she told them that their backing would have no influence on her editorial decisions. "I'm nosy as hell, and I ask a lot of questions," she said.

That sort of hard-nosed reporting and editorial leadership has won The Recorder the top public-service award from the Virginia Press Association in six of the last nine years, and "The paper has never flinched from taking a stand," said the narrator of the presentation video. Adams is immediate past president of VPA. Ginger Stanley, recently retired as VPA's executive director, said Adams has "put her heart and soul into our profession."

For more on Adams, click here; for more on Hutcheson, here. For background on the awards, go here.