History

The Distinguished Service Award was established in 1982, when PPN was still known as Bookbuilders West. This honor went to individuals who supported the ideals and goals of BBW while also maintaining the highest personal standards of craftmanship and devotion to their work. Nominations and selections were made by a group consisting of the current and former BBW presidents.

In 2021, PPN revised the criteria and selection processes to more fully recognize the contributions of those across the industry who work toward promoting excellence through education, career development, and community building.

Selection Criteria

Candidates for the DSA are individuals who demonstrate some combination of the following:

  • exemplification of the PPN mission to provide support, educational resources, and opportunities to all individuals involved in, or interested in joining, book-related publishing
  • devotion to, and support of, the highest possible standards for developing and crafting books and book-related publications
  • recognition for something extra that they have brought to the publishing community, whether it be unusual talent, brilliance, innovation, integrity, devotion, or helpfulness to others

Selection Process

  • PPN invites nominations from the broad publishing community through email blasts and social media.
  • Nominations can include brief essays and supporting information as available.
  • PPN’s DSA committee members review all entries and determine the recipient based on the selection criteria listed above.

The honoree is named at the PPN Book Show.

Recipients

1983 | Lon Driggers 1984 | Al Lindenbaum 1985 | Charles Goehring
1986 | Bill Ralph 1987 | Fran Mitchell 1988 | Roy Wallace
1989 | Patricia Brewer 1990 | Karen Judd 1991 | Bill Ketron
1992 | Casimira Kostecki 1993 | Elliott Derman 1994 | Jonathan Peck
1995 | Gordon Johnson 1996 | Chet Grycz 1997 | Detta Penna
1998 | Paul Butzler 1999 | Gary Head 2000 | Arlene Cowan
2001 | Don Smith 2002 | Tony Crouch 2003 | Karen Richardson
2004 | Rebecca Swee 2005 | Michele Bisson Savoy 2006 | Michael O’Brien
2007 | Stephen Thomas 2008 | Mary Lou Goforth 2009 | Sandy D’Amato
2010 | Leslie Austin 2011 | Elise Gochberg 2012 | Andrea Helmbolt
2013 | Mike Johnson 2014 | David Zielonka 2016 | Duncan McCallum
2016 | Duncan McCallum 2017 | Tona Pearce Myers 2018 | Scott Norton
2019 | Brenda Ginty 2020 | Johanna Vondeling