EILEEN Carron, the publisher/editor of The Tribune, is to be recognised for “more than 50 years of dedicated and courageous work at The Tribune” this month by the Bahamas Press Club at its first awards ceremony to honour pioneers in the field of journalism and mass communications in the country.

Mrs Carron, who has been in her post since 1972 as publisher, will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award and is among seven people to be recognised at the awards dinner at the British Colonial Hilton on Saturday, November 21.

At a press conference in the Exuma Room at the Hilton yesterday, Anthony Newbold, President of The Press Club, deemed it “a Red Letter day for us - for you and me, and all those news gatherers and reporters who came and went before us”. He said: “Seven people from our honourable and noble profession will be rewarded for their selfless contributions to media in The Bahamas. One of those persons will be given a Lifetime Achievement Award and one will be honoured posthumously, while the others will be branded as Pioneers.”

The posthumous honour will go to the late Kenneth N Francis, who rose from being a press operator at The Nassau Guardian to becoming the publisher and general manager of one of the oldest newspapers in the region, established in 1844.

The Pioneer Awards will go to Wendall Jones, of Jones Communication Network, for private radio broadcasting (Love 97), newspaper (Bahama Journal), and television (JCN); Anthony Ferguson, Guardian Talk Radio (96.9FM); Henry Saunders, (More 94 FM); Silbert Mills (Radio Abaco); and the Broadcasting Corporation of The Bahamas, ZNS Radio and Television.

The awards ceremony will be held under the patronage of former Governor General Sir Arthur Foulkes, himself a distinguished journalist.

“This is the first such event for The Bahamas Press Club but we expect that honouring our own will become a yearly happening,” Mr Newbold said.