Ancestry and Weber Shandwick won Campaign of the Year at the PRWeek Awards U.S. on Thursday evening for Railroad Ties.
Tapping into Ancestry’s rich database, the brand and Weber Shandwick traced the lineage of descendants of fugitive slaves and abolitionists to develop Railroad Ties, where long-lost records came to life as emotional stories.
Ancestry historians worked for months to uncover details of seven families. Record by record, complete stories were brought to life for the documentary.
Directed by leading documentarian Sacha Jenkins, the very human story of the Underground Railroad unfolds for the viewers through Ancestry records, with each discovery as dramatic as the next.
Railroad Ties also won Best in Multicultural Marketing, Best in Data Insight and Best in Broadcast, Film and Video.
Honorable Mention went to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, Powell Communications and Muhtayzik Hoffer for Runaway Train 25.
Finalists included Gillette and MMK+ (Ketchum) for We Believe; Skittles and ICF Next for Broadway the Rainbow; and USAA, Publicis and 160over90 for A Poppy Worn, A Hero Honored.
