The Clarksdale Press Register earned first-place honors from the Mississippi Press Association for its Women of Influence special section published in Nov. 2025.
The Mississippi Press Association convention was held in Biloxi from Thursday, June 25 to Saturday, June 27, and editorial awards for 2025 were presented. The Press Register was in the Class C category with similar size newspapers in Mississippi.
Women of Influence, formerly called Women in Business, was an annual special section of the Press Register for several years. The Press Register did not publish the section in 2023 and 2024, but brought it back in 2025 with the new name Women of Influence.
The Mississippi Press Association’s comments on the section were, “Very nicely done section. Good writing and advertising. Layout is very pleasing and easy to read.”
All employees at the Press Register contributed to the 2025 Women of Influence section.
Publisher Josh Troy wrote articles on Panny Mayfield, Dr. Toya Harrell-Matthews, Dr. Mallory Collins and Amy Morris. Mayfield is the founder of the Tennessee Williams Festival in Clarksdale, a former lifestyles editor for the Press Register, a published author and more. Harrell-Matthews is the Clarksdale Municipal School District Superintendent. Collins is an optometrist and founder of Riverview Eyecare. Morris is the founder of Free to Be Yoga Studio.
Troy also took photos and paginated pages for the section.
“Being recognized for our Women of Influence section is an honor and gratifying for many reasons,” Troy said. “One, we hadn’t published the section for two years so our staff had to work extra hard reintroducing it to the community. Two, the section received excellent community support. Three, publishing the section was a team effort. Everyone at the Press Register played a role and shares this honor.”
Ad manager Chris Mullins and former ad manager Mary Jane Burns sold the advertisements and made sure the Press Register had the support to produce the Women of Influence section. Mullins also wrote articles about Shelley Ritter and Maie Smith at the Delta Blues Museum and Tameal Edwards, Sadie Robertson, and Casey Ladd at Ground Zero Blues Club.
“Ms. Burns used this special section as an opportunity to introduce me to the community,” Mullins said. “It was a pleasure to meet our clients face-to-face. It was also a pleasure to write about the women at Ground Zero and the Delta Blues Museum. I have worked closely with Ground Zero over the years and became more acquainted with the Delta Blues Museum in the process. It goes without saying that women in Clarksdale make major contributions to the benefit of the community. Thank you to the community for your contributions.”
Burns expressed similar sentiments.
“This award was an unexpected and an amazing surprise,” Burns said. “Good things happened when our team stepped out of the box to create content for a fraction of our beautiful, professional and talented women in our hometown for the ‘Women of Influence’ special Section. We have a great team!”
Graphic designer and production manager Tracey Hankins-Riley designed most of the advertisements in the section and the front cover.
Office manager Laura Campbell did a little of bit of everything behind the scenes to make sure we had the support we needed to produce the section.
OTHER MISSISSIPPI PRESS ASSOCIATION AWARDS
The Press Register received a total of five awards at the convention in Biloxi. The other four are listed below.
• Second place for commentary column “Mississippi’s Sunshine Laws need improvement.”
• Third place for general news story “CMSD’s performance questioned”
• Honorable mention for game story “Lee Academy in State Championship Game.”
• Honorable mention for the August 14, 2025, front page.
