Hoch Publishing Company, publisher of the Marion County Record, Hillsboro Star-Journal, and Peabody Gazette-Bulletin, has won 17 awards in the Kansas Press Association 2013 Awards of Excellence.

“We don’t write the newspaper to win awards,” news editor Adam Stewart said. “We do it for our readers, but getting this recognition is a nice bonus.”

Eight of the awards are first-place awards: news and writing excellence, story and picture combination, news photo, feature photo, sports pages, headline writing, hardware ad, and automotive ad.

“I’m happiest about the news and writing excellence award, because that takes the broadest look at what we do,” Stewart said. “I’m also happy to see the award for story and picture combination because of how quickly we got that together.”

That award was for the newspaper’s coverage of flooding in late July. The flooding happened on a Tuesday, so the newspaper had just one day to get the story and pictures before printing.

The newspapers also received eight second-place awards and one third-place award.

The awards are divided into six categories, based on circulation and how often a paper is published. Hoch Publishing won its awards in the mid-size non-daily division.

First place

• Automotive ad, Melvin Honeyfield.
• Feature photo, Oliver Good.
• Hardware ad, Honeyfield.
• Headline writing, Eric Meyer.
• News and writing excellence, staff.
• News photo, Olivia Haselwood.
• Sports pages, staff.
• Story and picture combination, staff.

Second place

• Editorial pages, staff.
• Feature story, Good.
• Grocery ad, Honeyfield.
• Hardware ad, Honeyfield.
• Photo illustration, Meyer.
• Professional service ad, Honeyfield.
• Story originating from a public notice, Meyer.
• Use of photos, staff.

Third place

• Design and layout excellence, staff.