History

The Risser Prize for Western Environmental Journalism was established in 2005 to honor James V. Risser, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner and director emeritus of the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships at Stanford. 

Fellowships alumni came together to launch the award in recognition of Risser’s distinguished career as a journalist and leader of the JSK program from 1985 until his retirement in 2000. Risser is a former Washington bureau chief of the Des Moines Register, and he wrote frequently and incisively about environmental issues. He has had a particular interest in those issues as they affected the western United States.

The $5,000 prize was initially funded by contributions from JSK alumni and others associated with the program. Five years later, in 2010, the prize was permanently endowed and renamed The Knight-Risser Prize for Western Environmental Journalism after a successful fundraising effort that matched a challenge grant from the John S. and James L Knight Foundation. 

Originally and for the first decade-plus of its existence, the Knight-Risser Prize was a contest for published journalism works about environmental issues in the North American West. In addition to receiving a monetary award, winners were invited to participate in a symposium at Stanford about their reporting that was hosted by the JSK Fellowships and the Bill Lane Center for the American West.

In 2026, the prize was reoriented to provide up-front financial support for reporting. The founding goal remains the same: to inspire compelling and creative stories that shed light on significant environmental issues.