The Sidney Prize is awarded monthly for outstanding investigative journalism that exposes social and economic injustices. Winners receive a cash prize and an engraved medallion from the Hillman Foundation, which has been honoring journalists who pursue deep reporting for the public good since 1950. Previous winners include Jane Mayer for her work on Dick Cheney; Bill Moyers and Kathleen Hughes for their series on “Buying the War”; and George Packer’s superb profile of Angela Merkel in The New Yorker, which won a 2014 Sidney Prize.
The 2023 Neilma Sidney Short Story Prize was won by Annie Zhang for her story ‘Who Rattles the Night?’. The prize is a $5000 award plus the publication of the winning story in Overland’s autumn issue. The story was selected from a shortlist of eight. Two runners-up were also announced.
For this piece, reporters Maya Srikrishnan and Ashley Clarke worked to document how state governments were using the power of data requests to evade income taxes from low-income taxpayers. The team doggedly sought out new avenues to tell the story as states stalled, refused, or quoted outrageous fees for access to records. The story ultimately uncovered an alarming truth: nearly two-thirds of all states have not collected all the income taxes they are legally owed.
A man who bought a Lotto Max ticket at a Shoppers Drug Mart in Sidney won a $2 million lump sum prize in 2024. The winner is now free to spend his money as he sees fit, and he says that the biggest benefit of the win was peace of mind. He plans to purchase a house on the water and play more synthesizer in his spare time.
‘Shame Storm’: Helen Andrews on online viciousness
An extraordinary essay by an undergraduate about the strange world of online nasty behavior was one of this year’s winners of the Sidney Prize for First Things magazine. The piece is an astonishing evocation of how it feels to be the target of vicious attacks from fellow conservatives, especially in a televised forum.
The Committee established the Sidney Cox Memorial Prize to honor the memory of a distinguished graduate student and teacher at Dartmouth College. Letters have been sent to many of Sidney’s friends, and donations are welcome. Contributions should be made to the Sidney Cox Memorial Prize, c/o Professor Harry T. Schultz ’37, 1 Occom Ridge, Hanover, NH 03750. The Committee is grateful to those who have already contributed over $1500, but more is needed to establish the fund on a permanent basis. For more information, contact the Committee at: