Final Reader’s Choice prize awarded

January 10, 2013, 9:00 pm by Alexandria Randolph

Marble Falls resident Annette Ussery won the final Reader’s Choice Awards weekly ballot drawing of $50.

"I’m terribly excited about winning,” Ussery said. "I don’t win things very often.”

Ussery and her husband Lee live off of RR 1980 and have been subscribers of The Highlander since the beginning of the newspaper in 1959 when her husband first subscribed. She became a subscriber with him when they married in 1973.They will be celebrating their 40th anniversary this year.

"My husband was born in town on Avenue E 80 years ago,” Ussery said. "I opened up a catalogue sales agency in Marble Falls in 1967 on Main St. when The Highlander was one door down.”

Ellen Bode, associate publisher of The Highlander, Burnet Bulletin and The Llano County Journal, said, "the response from our readers this year to our annual Reader’s Choice Awards has been tremendous. Votes are now being tablulated and the winners will be announced in a special magazine next month that will be distributed with our newspapers.”

Ussery said that in the early days of The Highlander, her son won an award for selling the most subscriptions to the newspaper.

"He got to choose between cash and a bicycle, and he chose the bicycle,” she said.

Ussery’s two daughters and one of her sons live in Llano. Another son lives in Houston.

Ussery said she always reads the results of the Reader’s Choice Awards.

"I always read the results with great interest toward the winners. I like to see which businesses win. I didn’t vote unless I had personal experience with (the business),” she said. "I voted for my favorites in town.”