The 2025 duPont-Columbia Awards Winners Re-examine Black History
Co-Director Lisa Cortés accepts the duPont Silver Baton, along with Co-Director Diego Hurtado De Mendoza, for the Nat Geo documentary The Space Race.
by Vahini Shori, 2024-25 duPont Fellow
On January 22, the duPont-Columbia Awards recognized deeply reported and well told stories that re-examined history using today’s reporting tools and knowledge for fresh perspectives on Black history, legacies, and experiences. Across platforms, winners covered historical topics of enslavement, property and civil rights, the carceral system, as well as historical racial discrimination that has pervaded American lives. You can learn more about the duPont-recognized works and watch a duPont Awards excerpt for each Winner below:
“We were telling not just the story of this freed person, but of his child, his great grandchild and his great great grandchild who's alive today, and how that one—basically, that betrayal—impacts people alive today, black Americans alive today.”
Ceremony remarks from Alexia Fernandez Campbell, Senior Investigative Reporter at the Center for Public Integrity
40 Acres and a Lie is a three-part podcast that investigates a misunderstood government program that gave formerly enslaved people land titles, only to rescind them and exacerbate a wealth gap that continues to exist today.
“I find inspiration from Glenn Simmons, sitting in prison for eight years, five months, 18 days, and knowing he did not do this crime, just waking up every day and digging deep to find the hope that someday the truth is going to set him free—and indeed, it did.”
Ali Meyer, Anchor and Special Reporter at Oklahoma News 4
The Wrong Man highlighted the story of Glynn Simmons, a Black man wrongfully convicted for murder, and sentenced to death, in 1975. After spending 48 years behind bars, Simmons was finally exonerated, due in part to the efforts of reporter Ali Meyer and her team. This story highlights the disproportionate impact of the carceral system on Black Americans.
“It was really wonderful to have a chance to revisit and revisit the mistakes that were made and to try to bring some sense of healing to the communities that had suffered in its wake.”
Adrian Walker, Associate Editor at the Boston Globe
Murder in Boston is a reckoning for the city of Boston, where following the false claim that a Black assailant had killed a pregnant white woman, Black men were targeted and harassed in a manhunt by Boston police, causing historical racial divides in the city to deepen. The docuseries and podcast revisit that year with fresh eyes.
“In journalism and filmmaking, telling truths, especially the ones buried, is a radical act. It disrupts erasure, challenges power, and gives voice to the silenced in a time when truth itself is under attack.”
Ceremony remarks from Nazenet Habtezghi, producer of Birthing a Nation: The Resistance of Mary Gaffney
Birthing a Nation: The Resistance of Mary Gaffney is a short documentary that explores the forced reproduction practices in the antebellum South through the story of Mary Gaffney, an enslaved woman who took agency over her body. Watch the trailer here.
“Our mission with this film was clear - to shine a spotlight on the groundbreaking contributions of African-American astronauts, to expand the definition of who had “the right stuff”…This award is a testament to the importance of telling stories that matter, stories that are transformative and often long overdue.”
Ceremony remarks of co-director Lisa Cortés
The Space Race is a documentary that recounts the exciting story of the first Black astronauts at NASA. They fought to overcome the racism that stood in the way of being a part of the space program and redefined who has “the right stuff.”
You can learn more about our honorees on our Winners & Finalists page.