Texas Outdoor Writers Association

About Us

The primary purpose of the Texas Outdoors Writer’s Association is to improve knowledge and skill among its members in the art of communication through the written or spoken word and through art, illustration, and photography. This Association shall also strive to increase public awareness, understanding, and appreciation of our outdoor heritage in the use and enjoyment of our natural resources.
To accomplish this purpose, they will support the best use and wise management of all natural resources. They are strong supporters of conservation as defined in the North American Conservation Act. They will likewise strive to maintain the highest standards of professional competency and ethics in communicating to their respective readers or audiences. In all of their written, oral, and graphic arts communications they will strive to:
• Promote the highest quality of craftsmanship in the art of communicating the outdoors.
• Promote responsible ethics among both the communication and the outdoor sportsman.
• Promote fellowship among members of the outdoor media.
• Provide an interchange of information and techniques with the membership and with allied
organizations.
• Promote individualism among members without endorsing any particular stand.
• Promote goodwill among all political parties.

History of the Texas Outdoor Writers Association
The first group of outdoor writers in the state organized for the first time shortly after World War II. The late Fred Maly, then outdoor editor of the San Antonio Express News, called together various state outdoor writers and editors to travel together to various outdoor events to collect information for their paper’s outdoor news pages. The first included a tackle show in Chicago and a Canada fishing trip. The group disbanded in its second year. It wasn’t until the early ‘50s when a few outdoor editors on several large dailies around the state began meeting for informal hunting and fishing trips that the ideal of a formal association began to materialize.
The group promotes ethics and fellowship among its members and provides a means of exchanging information and techniques that improve the quality of their professional efforts.