D. Orlando Ledbetter 

Ledbetter worked with the Howard University football team (public address announcer 1980-84 with Barry Hudson as his spotter). He also worked with The Hilltop (traveling beat writer) as a ground-breaking student journalist who wrote 98 articles and covered the Dunk Patrol basketball team and the 1983-84 team in Hawaii. He was the lead sports writer on Isabel Wilkerson’s staff as a sophomore before going on to become the Editor-in-Chief of the Hilltop as a senior. Ledbetter helped to pave the way for several future Howard alums in sports field. That group includes Steve Wyche, Jim Trotter, Terez Paylor and Gus Johnson who followed Ledbetter into sports journalism. He’s a member of the Writer’s Wing of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio after winning the 2024 Bill Nunn Jr. Award. 

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He covered the Falcons and the NFL for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Among Ledbetter’s other professional honors, he was selected as the 2022 Georgia Co-Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sports Media Association to go with three Associated Press Sports Editor writing awards and a PWFA Dick Connor Writing Awards category first-place. He is a longtime member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame Selection Committee. He also was a founder and the first secretary of the NABJ Sports Task Force.  He’s also worked at The Milwaukee Journal, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, the Cincinnati Enquirer and the Charlotte Observer.