Local girl wins big National Geographic photo contest
A local girl is getting big recognition from National Geographic. Kate Anderson is a 12-year-old from Shelley. She is taking home the grand prize in photography in multiple categories, nationally and internationally.
“I won the first place for the U.S. And then, I won the grand prize for the International. And the prize was the trip to the Galapagos Islands,” Kate Anderson said.
“It’s still surprising and amazing that a little farm-town girl can create something this big,” said her mom, Cambria.
Anderson’s grand prize photo is of a baby chick with a microphone. She calls the photo, “Owning the Stage.” It was also in the “Weird But True” category of the competition and was selected No. 1 from the more-than 3,400 photos submitted nationally. She also won the international title — being picked out of 46,000 photos across the globe. Anderson has won many prizes for her unique photo, but the most notable is a 10-day National Geographic Galapagos family vacation.
“When I got the email, I, like — at first it said that I won first place and I was just screaming. I was so excited about that. And then I read further and it said that I won the grand prize, and I, like, exploded, I was so excited,” Kate Anderson said.
As the girl behind the lens, she took the photo last spring when her chickens were chicks.
“I dressed them up. I used Barbie props. So out of different props, I chose the microphone and then I set him there and he did the rest,” Anderson said.
“She always has enjoyed her National Geographic magazines and wanted to enter in different contests. And so when she decided, she picked all of the pictures that she took for each of the different categories. And I looked at them thinking, ‘That’s great she’s going to enter, but there’s just no way with all of these fabulous photographers that entered this. So it was a complete shock,” Cambria Anderson said.
To be nationally and internationally recognized is one thing, but Anderson is over the moon about winning a $20,000-trip to the Galapagos Islands — someplace she’s wanted to visit for years.
“I’ve always wanted to go there since I was in first grade [when] I found out about it. And I really liked all the animals and stuff there. So then I saw that coming up and I thought it’d be worth a try, even though I probably wouldn’t, you know, win it. But I thought it would be fun to do,” Kate Anderson said.
But win she did, and out of the many other prizes she won, she also gets to take a trip to Washington D.C., for a tour of the National Geographic Headquarters.
Anderson’s photo and the other U.S. category winners will be featured in the May 2017 U.S. Edition of the National Geographic Kids magazine. That issue will reach about 4 million readers across the nation.
