BVD Image Wins 2021 Mel Ruder Photograph of the Year

The image of an unidentified young girl getting a hand with her shoes during the Boot Race at last summer's Lincoln Rodeo by BVD Editor Roger Dey earned first place in the Montana Newspaper Association's 2021 Better Newspaper Contest Division 1 Feature Photo category.

It was also selected as the Mel Ruder Photograph of the Year. The award marks the second time judges selected a BVD photo as Photograph of the Year.

In the 2019 Better Newspaper Contest, judges selected an image by Dey of a bronc rider on a rolling horse, taken during the 2018 Helmville Labor Day Rodeo as photo of the year.

"Considering the competition from all the other newspapers and from all the other photographers who entered, winning Photograph of the Year one time was pretty unexpected and amazing, so winning it a second time in three years is pretty cool." Dey said.

The award is named for Mel Ruder, who started the Hungry Horse News in 1946. He won Montana's first Pulitzer prize in 1965 for his extensive coverage of the floods 1964. Ruder distinguished the Hungry Horse News through both the number of photos he published and his outstanding images.