Ohio University professor Marcy Nighswander was presented the Robert S. Carson Memorial Award by ONPA for outstanding contribution to photojournalism during the annual seminar at Ohio University. The award is considered ONPA’s highest honor.
A graduate of Bowling Green State University Nighswander began her career as a staff photographer for the Review-Times in Fostoria, Ohio. She moved on to the Akron Beacon Journal where she was ONPA Photographer of the Year for her work in 1976 and was the first woman to achieve that distinction.
After ten years in Akron she went to the Cincinnati Post and then on to the Associated Press Washington Bureau where she was part of a team that won the Pulitzer Prize in Feature Photography for a collection of images from the 1992 presidential campaign.
Since 1995 Nighswander has been a professor at the School of Visual Communication at Ohio University. Her co-worker Terry Eiler, professor emeritus at Ohio University, made the presentation after taking the surprised recipient on a visual walk down memory lane.