Each year at the FPRA PR & Comms Summit, we take time to honor our exemplary members with the Doris Fleischman Award, the John W. Dillin Award, and the Joe Curley Rising Leader Award. However, how many of us are aware of the contributions the award namesakes had on our field? These brief biographies of their incredible lives gives us a little insight as to why we continue to use their names to represent the best public relations professionals. Let’s take a moment to be grateful for the shoulders upon which we stand.
Doris Fleishman
Doris Fleishman was born July 18, 1891 in New York City. She studied philosophy, psychology, and English at Barnard College and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in 1913. When her childhood friend, Edward Bernays opened a publicity firm in 1919, Fleischman was his first hire. When they married in 1922, Doris made headlines for continuing to use her maiden name and was the first American woman to have a passport issued with her maiden name. And, after their marriage, Doris became an equal partner in the publicity firm.
In addition to working for the firm, writing articles, and founding the Edward L. Bernays Foundation, Doris was also active in the Woman Pays Club which fought prejudice against women, published “An Outline of Careers for Women: A Practical Guide to Achievement,” and
served as vice president for the women’s rights organization, Lucy Stone League. It’s no surprise that her obituary in the New York Times described her as an ‘enthusiastic feminist’!
In 1994, FPRA began honoring her by presenting the Doris Fleischman Award at the annual FPRA PR & Comms Summit to one member in recognition of selfless, steadfast, and quiet contributions to the public relations profession through the Florida Public Relations Association.
CWC-FPRA has had two members honored with the Doris Fleischman Award: Ginya Carnahan (2003) and Joe Curley (2005).
Lt. Col. John Woodward Dillin, APR, CPRC
Lt. Col. John W. Dillin was born on December 15, 1909 in Chicago, Illinois. His family moved to Florida in 1925 and sadly lost everything the next year during the 1926 hurricane. John ended up attending eight high schools before graduating from San Diego High School where he worked on the school paper and served as class president.
After graduating, he founded a newspaper in Jacumba Springs, CA. When that closed due to difficulties during the depression, he went on to study journalism at San Diego State University. He then returned to Florida and worked in publicity for the Chamber of Commerces in Miami Beach, St. Augustine, and Lake Wales.
In 1938, a young John W. Dillin founded and became the first president of the Florida Association of Publicity Directors, which we know today as the Florida Public Relations Association. He did this to uphold credibility and ethics in the profession. He also served a second term as state president in 1953.
During World War II Dillin served in the Air Force and then became the Public Relations Officer for the Florida National Air National Guard.
Lt. Col. John W. Dillin passed away on August 27, 1998. He has two monuments: one in Arlington National Cemetery and one in Sebring, Florida where ‘CPRC’ is proudly etched on his tombstone.
Today, we award the John W. Dillin Award annually at the FPRA PR & Comms Summit to honor his lifetime of service to and support of the Association. And we eat a Dillin Dessert to remember his love of chocolate!
The first John W. Dillin Award was awarded to Dillin himself ad since then we have had five CWC-FPRA members receive this honor: Joe Curley, APR, CPRC (1993), Ginnie Duffey-Troyer, APR, CPRC (2000), Jennifer Moss-Wilson, APR, CPRC (2016), Cheray Keyes-Shima, APR, CPRC (2017), and Chris Carroll, APR, CPRC (2020).
Joe Curley, APR, CPRC
Joe Curley, APR, CPRC met Roger Pynn APR, CPRC through FPRA and in 1984 they founded one of Florida’s largest PR firms, Curley & Pynn Public Relations Management in Orlando. When Joe sold the firm in 2004, he was retained by Universal Studios Parks & Resorts as Senior Corporate Communications Counsel, international marketing & PR, and retired in March 2018 to an on-call status to support special projects. He was directly involved in theme park projects in Singapore, Japan, Russia, China, Dubai and South Korea.
Joe is a past state president of FPRA and currently on the Board of Directors for the Central West Coast Chapter of FPRA. Joe has been honored by FPRA over the years by receiving virtually every high performance and leadership award the Association recognizes.
At the 2025 FPRA PR & Comms Summit, we will celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Joe Curley Rising Leader Award program. This accolade is intended to identify and honor up-and-coming individual FPRA members who demonstrate emerging leadership traits along with dedicated active involvement in FPRA Chapter activities, programs, functions, and events.
Our CWC-FPRA Joe Curley Rising Leaders include: Jennifer Hemmerdinger, APR, Laura Ansel, APR, CPRC, Travis Cornwell, Hunter Carpenter, MA, APR, Sarah Glendening, APR, Andrea Knies, APR, Eleni Kouvatsos, APR, Kim Livengood, APR, CPRC, Sharon Kunkel, APR, CPRC, Rhonda Leiberick, APR, Jeremy Piper, and Tara Poulton.
To learn more about the history of CWC-FPRA and its past award winners, visit https://cwcfpra.com/the-history-of-cwc-fpra/