| 2022 | Luci Tapahonso |
| 2021 | No award was given due to rescheduling of the conference to 2022. |
| 2020 | Juan Felipe Herrera |
| 2020 | Stephen Graham Jones |
| 2019 | Leslie Marmon Silko |
| 2018 | Percival Everett & José E. Limón |
| 2017 | Rick Shiomi |
| 2016 | Maxine Hong Kingston |
| 2015 | LeAnne Howe & Robert Laxalt |
| 2014 | Connie Kaldor |
| 2013 | Robert Hass & Louis Owens |
| 2012 | Richard Slotkin & Joss Whedon |
| 2011 | Thomas McGuane |
| 2010 | Luis Valdez |
| 2009 | Cormac McCarthy |
| 2008 | William Kittredge and Patty Limerick |
| 2007 | Sherman Alexie |
| 2006 | Terry Tempest Williams |
| 2005 | Gerald Vizenor and Joan Didion |
| 2004 | Mary Clearman Blew and Thomas King |
| 2003 | Sandra Cisneros and José David Saldívar, Ramón Saldívar, and Sonia Saldívar-Hull |
| 2002 | Annette Kolodny and Alberto A. Ríos |
| 2001 | Patricia Hampl and Roderick Nash |
| 2000 | Joy Harjo |
| 1999 | James D. Houston and Gerald Haslam |
| 1998 | Rudy Wiebe |
| 1997 | Rudolfo Anaya |
| 1996 | Tillie Olsen |
| 1995 | Robert Kroetsch |
| 1994 | James Maguire, Wayne Chatterton, and James Welch |
| 1993 | Tony Hillerman |
| 1992 | Louise Erdrich |
| 1991 | Ann Zwinger |
| 1990 | Elmer Kelton |
| 1989 | Ivan Doig and Mildred R. Bennett |
| 1988 | Ken Kesey and Max Westbrook |
| 1987 | Larry McMurtry and Thomas J. Lyon |
| 1986 | Benjamin Capps and Don D. Walker |
| 1985 | Américo Paredes and William Eastlake |
| 1984 | Gary Snyder |
| 1983 | N. Scott Momaday |
| 1982 | Thomas Hornsby Ferril |
| 1981 | Dorothy Johnson |
| 1980 | Sophus Keith Winther and Bernice Slote |
| 1979 | Wright Morris |
| 1978 | Edward Abbey |
| 1977 | Thomas McGrath |
| 1976 | William Stafford |
| 1975 | Jack Schaefer |
| 1974 | Wallace Stegner and J. Golden Taylor |
| 1973 | Paul Horgan |
| 1972 | A. B. Guthrie, Jr. |
| 1971 | Harvey Fergusson and John G. Neihardt |
| 1970 | Henry Nash Smith |
| 1969 | Walter Van Tilburg Clark |
| 1968 | Frank Waters |
| 1967 | Frederick Manfred |
| 1966 | Vardis Fisher |
