Several OU Daily alumni contributed to 2018 Pulitzer Prize-winning journalism announced April 16.
Dana Branham, The Daily’s 2016-2017 editor-in-chief, contributed to the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Seven Days of Heroin project that won the Pulitzer Prize in local reporting. The project was recognized “for a riveting and insightful narrative and video documenting seven days of greater Cincinnati heroin epidemic, revealing how the deadly addiction has ravaged families and communities.”
Branham, who interned at the Enquirer during the summer of 2017, was one of about 60 people involved in a week-long, staff-wide effort to observe and record the overwhelming impact of the heroin epidemic on the Cincinnati community through extensive reporting, photography and videography.
“I feel really grateful to have gotten to learn from all the people that were a part of this project,” Branham said. “It's just an amazing group of local journalists out there.”
Branham, whose contribution to the project included spending several hours taking extensive notes at a block party celebrating recovery from addiction, said the experience taught her about observatory reporting.
“I learned a lot about how to be more of an observatory kind of journalist,” Branham said. “I feel like my observation skills were heightened like crazy through working on this because the goal was gather as much detail as you can, try to notice everything that you’re seeing and make sure your notes reflect the depths of everything that was going on.”
Two Enquirer writers, Dan Horn and Terry DeMio, poured over notes from Branham and many others to create a long-form narrative timestamped over a seven day period. Branham's piece of the project is a scene from 7:30 p.m. Friday that includes lyrics from a rap delivered by a recovered heroin addict at the block party.
“It was just really fascinating and opened my eyes a lot to the reality of how so many people are touched by the heroin epidemic in Cincinnati,” Branham said. “...the Enquirer knows that heroin is a problem in the city and that this touches a lot of lives, but to be able to put it in this sort of project really just drove it home.”
David Fallis, a 1988 OU Daily alumnus and the Washington Post’s deputy investigative editor, was involved in coverage of U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore that won the Pulitzer Prize in investigative reporting for “purposeful and relentless reporting that changed the course of a Senate race in Alabama by revealing a candidate’s alleged past sexual harassment of teenage girls and subsequent efforts to undermine the journalism that exposed it.”
Fallis said in an email that he helped provide support, consultation and an extra set of eyes for the Moore coverage, which was led by quick-strike investigation team editor Eric Rich. In 2015, Fallis led and edited a project investigating police shootings that won a Pulitzer for National Reporting.
