Dunn Award Winner Announced

Ann Allen is the winner of the Indiana Historical Society’s annual Jacob Piatt Dunn Jr. Award for the best article to appear in Traces of Indiana and Midwestern History for 2008. Allen, pictured at right receiving her award from James H. Madison, IHS trustee, won for her article, “Reece Oliver: Indiana’s Shadow Hero,” which appeared in the summer 2008 issue of Traces.

Named for the noted Indiana historian and author, the $500 award honors the article that in the opinion of the Traces editorial board and staff best serves the magazine’s mission. This mission involves presenting thoughtful, research-based articles on Indiana history in an attractive format to a broad audience of readers.

Former editor of the Akron/Mentone News, Allen has written about Akron, Indiana, and its residents for nearly fifty years, including her time as a correspondent for the Rochester Sentinel. She has written four books set in Akron. Allen is a past president of the Woman’s Press Club of Indiana.

Dunn, who helped revitalize the Society in the 1880s, produced such standard works as the two-volume Greater Indianapolis (1910) and his five-volume Indiana and Indianans (1919). In his remarkable career, Dunn also worked on a variety of Indianapolis newspapers, campaigned to establish free public libraries, endeavored to preserve the language of the Miami Indians, and prospected for minerals in Haiti.