Pulitzer Prize Special Citations and Awards
Encyclopedia
The Pulitzer Prize
jury has the option of awarding special citations where they consider necessary.
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
jury has the option of awarding special citations where they consider necessary.
Journalism awards
- 1924: A special prize of $1000 was awarded to the widow of Frank I. CobbFrank I. CobbFrank Irving Cobb was an American journalist. He succeeded Joseph Pulitzer as editor of The New York World, owned by Joseph Pulitzer. Cobb became famous for his editorials in support of the policies of liberal Democrats such as Woodrow Wilson.-Career:Cobb was born to a Yankee farm family in...
, New York WorldNew York WorldThe New York World was a newspaper published in New York City from 1860 until 1931. The paper played a major role in the history of American newspapers...
, in recognition of the distinction of her husband's editorial writing and service. - 1930: William O. Dapping, Auburn Citizen (New York). A special prize for his reportorial work in connection with the outbreak at Auburn prison during December, 1929.
- 1938: Edmonton JournalEdmonton JournalThe Edmonton Journal is a daily newspaper in Edmonton, Alberta. It is part of the Postmedia Network.-History:The Journal was founded in 1903 by three local businessmen — John Macpherson, Arthur Moore and J.W. Cunningham — as a rival to Alberta's first newspaper, the 23-year-old...
. A special bronze plaque for its editorial leadership against the Accurate News and Information ActAccurate News and Information ActThe Accurate News and Information Act was a statute passed by the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, Canada, in 1937, at the instigation of William Aberhart's Social Credit government...
, in defense of the freedom of the press, in the Province of AlbertaAlbertaAlberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...
, Canada. - 1941: The New York TimesThe New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, for the public educational value of its foreign news report, exemplified by its scope, by excellence of writing and presentation and supplementary background information, illustration, and interpretation - 1944: Byron PriceByron PriceByron Price was director of the Office of Censorship for the United States government during World War II. For his role, he was recognized with a Pulitzer Prize in 1944. After the war he was appointed as the Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations. In 1946, President Harry S...
, Director of the Office of Censorship, for the creation and administration of the newspaper and radio codes. - 1947: The St. Louis Post-DispatchSt. Louis Post-DispatchThe St. Louis Post-Dispatch is the major city-wide newspaper in St. Louis, Missouri. Although written to serve Greater St. Louis, the Post-Dispatch is one of the largest newspapers in the Midwestern United States, and is available and read as far west as Kansas City, Missouri, as far south as...
, for its unswerving adherence to the public and professional ideals of its founder and its constructive leadership in the field of American journalism. - 1951: Cyrus L. Sulzberger of The New York TimesThe New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
for his exclusive interview with Archbishop Stepinac. - 1951: The Advisory Board on the Pulitzer Prizes as a policy does not make any award to an individual member of the Board. In 1951, the Board decided that the outstanding instance of National Reporting done in 1950 was the exclusive interview with President Truman obtained by Arthur KrockArthur KrockArthur Krock was a journalist and received the nickname "Dean of Washington newsmen". Born in Glasgow, Kentucky in 1887, he grew up with his grandparents, Emmanuel and Henrietta Morris...
of The New York TimesThe New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, while Mr. Krock was a Board member. The Board therefore made no award in the National ReportingPulitzer Prize for National ReportingThe Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting has been awarded since 1948 for a distinguished example of reporting on national affairs. The Pulitzer Committee issues an official citation explaining the reasons for the award....
category. - 1952: Max KaseMax KaseMax Kase was an American newspaper writer and editor. He worked for the Hearst newspapers from 1917 to 1966 and was the sports editor of the New York Journal-American from 1938 to 1966. In 1946, he was one of the driving forces behind the creation of the New York Knicks and the Basketball...
of the New York Journal-American for his exclusive exposures of bribery and other forms of corruption in the popular American sport of basketballBasketballBasketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...
, which exposures tended to restore confidence in the game's integrity. - 1952: The Kansas City StarThe Kansas City StarThe Kansas City Star is a McClatchy newspaper based in Kansas City, Missouri, in the United States. Published since 1880, the paper is the recipient of eight Pulitzer Prizes...
, for the news coverage of the great regional flood of 1951 in KansasKansasKansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...
and Northwestern MissouriMissouriMissouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
- a distinguished example of editing and reporting that also gave the advance information that achieved the maximum of public protection. - 1953: The New York TimesThe New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, for the section of its Sunday newspaper edited by Lester Markel and headed, "Review of the Week," which for seventeen years has brought enlightenment and intelligent commentary to its readers. - 1958: Walter LippmannWalter LippmannWalter Lippmann was an American intellectual, writer, reporter, and political commentator famous for being among the first to introduce the concept of Cold War...
; nationally syndicated columnist of New York Herald TribuneNew York Herald TribuneThe New York Herald Tribune was a daily newspaper created in 1924 when the New York Tribune acquired the New York Herald.Other predecessors, which had earlier merged into the New York Tribune, included the original The New Yorker newsweekly , and the Whig Party's Log Cabin.The paper was home to...
, for the wisdom, perception and high sense of responsibility with which he has commented for many years on national and international affairs. - 1964: Gannett NewspapersGannett CompanyGannett Company, Inc. is a publicly-traded media holding company headquartered in Tysons Corner, Virginia, United States, near McLean. It is the largest U.S. newspaper publisher as measured by total daily circulation. Its assets include the national newspaper USA Today and the weekly USA Weekend...
. A special citation for their program, "The Road To Integration," a distinguished example of the use of a newspaper group's resources to complement the work of its individual newspapers. - 1978: Richard Lee Strout, for distinguished commentary from Washington over many years as staff correspondent for The Christian Science Monitor and contributor to The New RepublicThe New RepublicThe magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
.
Letters awards
- 1918: Love Songs by Sara TeasdaleSara TeasdaleSara Teasdale , was an American lyrical poet. She was born Sara Trevor Teasdale in St. Louis, Missouri, and after her marriage in 1914 she went by the name Sara Teasdale Filsinger.-Biography:...
. This award was made possible by a special grant from The Poetry Society. - 1919: Corn Huskers by Carl SandburgCarl SandburgCarl Sandburg was an American writer and editor, best known for his poetry. He won three Pulitzer Prizes, two for his poetry and another for a biography of Abraham Lincoln. H. L. Mencken called Carl Sandburg "indubitably an American in every pulse-beat."-Biography:Sandburg was born in Galesburg,...
. This award was made possible by a special grant from The Poetry Society. - 1919: Old Road to Paradise by Margaret WiddemerMargaret WiddemerMargaret Widdemer was a U.S. poet and novelist. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1919 for her collection The Old Road to Paradise, sharing the prize with Carl Sandburg, who won for his collection Corn Huskers.-Biography:Margaret Widdemer was born in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, and grew up...
. This award was made possible by a special grant from The Poetry Society. - 1957: Kenneth RobertsKenneth RobertsRoberts graduated from Cornell University in 1908, where he wrote the lyrics for two Cornell fight songs, including Fight for Cornell. He was also a member of the Quill and Dagger society...
. A special citation is awarded to Kenneth Roberts for his historical novels which have long contributed to the creation of greater interest in our early American history. - 1960: A special citation is awarded to The Defeat of the Spanish ArmadaThe Defeat of the Spanish ArmadaThe Armada is a popular history by Garrett Mattingly—a historian who taught at Columbia University—about the attempt of the Spanish Armada to invade England...
by Garrett MattinglyGarrett MattinglyGarrett Mattingly was a professor of European history at Columbia University who specialized in early modern diplomatic history and won a Pulitzer Prize for a bestseller about the Spanish Armada....
, published by Houghton, Mifflin. It is a first class history and a literary work of high order. - 1961: American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War. A special citation is given to The American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War as a distinguished example of American book publishing.
- 1973: James Thomas FlexnerJames Thomas FlexnerJames Thomas Flexner was an American historian and author best known for his prize-winning four-volume biography of George Washington, which earned him a National Book Award and a special Pulitzer Prize citation...
. A special citation to George Washington, Vols. I-IV, by James Thomas Flexner. - 1977: Alex HaleyAlex HaleyAlexander Murray Palmer Haley was an African-American writer. He is best known as the author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family and the coauthor of The Autobiography of Malcolm X.-Early life:...
. A special award to Alex Haley for RootsRoots: The Saga of an American FamilyRoots: The Saga of an American Family is a novel written by Alex Haley and first published in 1976. It tells the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African, captured as an adolescent and sold into slavery in the United States, and follows his life and the lives of his descendants in the U.S....
, the story of a black family from its origins in Africa through seven generations to the present day in America. - 1978: E.B. White. A special citation to E. B. White for his letters, essays and the full body of his work.
- 1984: A special citation to Theodor Seuss GeiselDr. SeussTheodor Seuss Geisel was an American writer, poet, and cartoonist most widely known for his children's books written under the pen names Dr. Seuss, Theo LeSieg and, in one case, Rosetta Stone....
, more widely known as Dr. Seuss, for his special contribution over nearly half a century to the education and enjoyment of America's children and their parents. - 1992: Art SpiegelmanArt SpiegelmanArt Spiegelman is an American comics artist, editor, and advocate for the medium of comics, best known for his Pulitzer Prize-winning comic book memoir, Maus. His works are published with his name in lowercase: art spiegelman.-Biography:Spiegelman was born in Stockholm, Sweden, to Polish Jews...
for MausMausMaus: A Survivor's Tale, by Art Spiegelman, is a biography of the author's father, Vladek Spiegelman, a Polish Jew and Holocaust survivor. It alternates between descriptions of Vladek's life in Poland before and during the Second World War and Vladek's later life in the Rego Park neighborhood of...
. - 2006: Edmund S. Morgan. A Special Citation to Edmund S. Morgan for a creative and deeply influential body of work as an American historian that spans the last half century.
Arts awards
- 19441944 Pulitzer Prize-Journalism awards:*Public Service:** The New York Times for its survey of the teaching of American History.*Reporting:** Paul Schoenstein and Associates of New York Journal American For a news story published on August 12, 1943, which saved the life of a two-year-old girl in the Lutheran Hospital...
: Richard RodgersRichard RodgersRichard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
and Oscar Hammerstein IIOscar Hammerstein IIOscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II was an American librettist, theatrical producer, and theatre director of musicals for almost forty years. Hammerstein won eight Tony Awards and was twice awarded an Academy Award for "Best Original Song". Many of his songs are standard repertoire for...
. A special award for Oklahoma! - 19741974 Pulitzer Prize-Journalism awards:*Public Service:** Newsday, Garden City, New York, for its definitive report on the illicit narcotic traffic in the United States and abroad, entitled, The Heroin Trail.*Local General or Spot News Reporting:...
: Roger SessionsRoger SessionsRoger Huntington Sessions was an American composer, critic, and teacher of music.-Life:Sessions was born in Brooklyn, New York, to a family that could trace its roots back to the American revolution. His mother, Ruth Huntington Sessions, was a direct descendent of Samuel Huntington, a signer of...
. A special citation to Roger Sessions for his life's work as a distinguished American composer. - 19761976 Pulitzer Prize-Journalism awards:*Public Service:** The Anchorage Daily News, for its disclosures of the impact and influence of the Teamsters Union on Alaska's economy and politics.*Local General or Spot News Reporting:...
: Scott JoplinScott JoplinScott Joplin was an American composer and pianist. Joplin achieved fame for his ragtime compositions, and was later dubbed "The King of Ragtime". During his brief career, Joplin wrote 44 original ragtime pieces, one ragtime ballet, and two operas...
. A special award is bestowed posthumously on Scott Joplin, in this Bicentennial Year, for his contributions to American music. - 19821982 Pulitzer Prize-Journalism awards:*Public Service:**The Detroit News, for exposing a cover-up in the U.S. Navy, which led to reforms in the Navy.*Local General or Spot News Reporting:...
: Milton BabbittMilton BabbittMilton Byron Babbitt was an American composer, music theorist, and teacher. He is particularly noted for his serial and electronic music.-Biography:...
. A special citation to Milton Babbitt for his life's work as a distinguished and seminal American composer. - 19851985 Pulitzer PrizeThe following are the Pulitzer Prizes for 1985.-Journalism awards:*Public Service:** The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, For reporting by Mark J. Thompson which revealed that nearly 250 U.S...
: A special citation to William SchumanWilliam SchumanWilliam Howard Schuman was an American composer and music administrator.-Life:Born in Manhattan in New York City to Samuel and Rachel Schuman, Schuman was named after the twenty-seventh U.S. president, William Howard Taft, although his family preferred to call him Bill...
for more than half a century of contribution to American music as composer and educational leader. - 19981998 Pulitzer Prize-Journalism:-Letters:* Biography or Autobiography** Personal History by Katharine Graham * Fiction** American Pastoral by Philip Roth * History...
: George GershwinGeorge GershwinGeorge Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...
. Awarded posthumously to George Gershwin, commemorating the centennial year of his birth, for his distinguished and enduring contributions to American music. - 19991999 Pulitzer Prize- Journalism awards :*Public Service:**The Washington Post, for its series that identified and analyzed patterns of reckless gunplay by city police officers who had little training or supervision.*Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Reporting:...
: Duke EllingtonDuke EllingtonEdward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
. Bestowed posthumously on Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington, commemorating the centennial year of his birth, in recognition of his musical genius, which evoked aesthetically the principles of democracy through the medium of jazz and thus made an indelible contribution to art and culture. - 20062006 Pulitzer PrizeThe 2006 Pulitzer Prizes were announced on April 17, 2006.The board announced in December 2005, that they will consider more online material in all 14 journalism categories....
: Thelonious MonkThelonious MonkThelonious Sphere Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer considered "one of the giants of American music". Monk had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including "Epistrophy", "'Round Midnight", "Blue Monk", "Straight, No Chaser"...
, for a "body of distinguished and innovative musical compositionMusical compositionMusical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...
that has had a significant and enduring impact on the evolution of jazzJazzJazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
." - 20072007 Pulitzer PrizeThe Pulitzer Prizes for 2007 were announced on April 16, 2007.In November 2006, the Pulitzer Prize Board announced two changes that would apply for the 2007 awards:...
: Ray BradburyRay BradburyRay Douglas Bradbury is an American fantasy, horror, science fiction, and mystery writer. Best known for his dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451 and for the science fiction stories gathered together as The Martian Chronicles and The Illustrated Man , Bradbury is one of the most celebrated among 20th...
, for his "distinguished, prolific and deeply influential career as an unmatched author of science fiction and fantasy" and John ColtraneJohn ColtraneJohn William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...
, for his "masterful improvisation, supreme musicianship and iconic centrality to the history of jazzJazzJazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
." - 20082008 Pulitzer PrizeThe 2008 Pulitzer Prizes were announced on April 7, 2008, the 92nd annual awards.The Washington Post won six awards, second only to the seven won by The New York Times in 2002. Three organizations were awarded prizes for the first time: Reuters, Investor's Business Daily and the Concord Monitor...
: Bob DylanBob DylanBob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
, "for his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power."
Pulitzer Prize service awards
- 1944: Mrs. William Allen White. A scroll indicating appreciation of Mr. White's interest and services during the past seven years as a member of the Advisory Board of the Graduate School of Journalism, Columbia University.
- 1947: Columbia UniversityColumbia UniversityColumbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
and the Graduate School of Journalism, for their efforts to maintain and advance the high standards governing the Pulitzer Prize awards. - 1948: Dr. Frank D. FackenthalFrank D. FackenthalFrank Diehl Fackenthal was an American educator.Fackenthal graduated from Columbia University in 1906. He served Columbia as chief clerk , secretary , and provost . Between the retirement of Nicholas Murray Butler and the installation of General Dwight D. Eisenhower as president , Dr...
. A scroll indicating appreciation of Dr. Fackenthal's interest and service during the past years. - 1976: Professor John Hohenberg. A special citation and an antique plaque inscribed by all the members of the Advisory Board, expressing appreciation for his services for 22 years as Administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes and for his achievements as teacher and journalist.
- 1985: Joseph Pulitzer, Jr., for his extraordinary services to American journalism and letters during his 31 years as chairman of the Pulitzer Prize Board and for his accomplishments as an editor and publisher.