[CQ-Contest] A little section history
Kenneth E. Harker
kenharker at kenharker.com
Fri Aug 10 11:13:41 PDT 2012
Jack,
I looked up the results article for the 1979 Sweepstakes ("Results,
46th Annual ARRL November Sweepstakes" by Tom Frenaye K1KI and Bill
Jennings K1WJ, QST, May 1980, pp. 77-86). It is clear that the contest
administrators did not include the Canal Zone as a section/multiplier in the
1979 contest and there were only 74 multipliers. From the second paragraph
of the article: "The deletion of the Canal Zone as a section may have
helped make the way easier, on cw anyway, but in all, 478 clean sweeps were
recorded."
The announcement for the 1979 Sweepstakes, published in the October, 1979
issue of QST, did not have a list of sections in it, but refered to a listing
on page 8, which I cannot see in the QST archives because there was no article
content on page 8, and everything in the online archives is broken down by
article. However, the October, 1979 issue did have a listing of Sweepstakes
record scores in that issue of QST (immediately adjacent to the 1979 contest
announcement). The records did have a listing for Canal Zone in it, so maybe
that's a source of confusion. The Sweepstakes records for Canal Zone are
held by KZ5FR on CW (138,262 points, set in 1978) and KZ5NO (K1MM, op.) on
phone (163,950 points, also set in 1978).
It looks like WA4FIB actually missed the sweep by four sections in the
1979 phone sweepstakes.
Ah, fun with old magazines :-)
-Ken WM5R
On Thu, Aug 09, 2012 at 10:41:14PM -0700, Jack Brindle wrote:
> Ken;
>
> Even though the US handed over control of the Canal Zone in October 1979, the section still existed for Sweepstakes that year. The 1979 Sweepstakes was in fact the least year for the CZ section. I was operating from South Florida that year and missed a sweep by just one section - yup, CZ.
>
> The 1979 Sweepstakes announcement was printed in the October, 1979 issue of QST. The article states that the sections listed on page 8 of that issue were part of the contest. As I recall, there were a few KZ5s on that year, although none showed up in my log.
>
> 73!
>
> Jack Brindle, W6FB
>
> On Aug 9, 2012, at 7:44 PM, Kenneth E. Harker wrote:
>
> > A while back, I began researching some of the changes made over the
> > years in the ARRL and Canadian sections used in the Sweepstakes (mostly
> > using the online QST archive at http://www.arrl.org/qst/). I learned
> > quite a lot, but I still have some gaps in my timeline about when certain
> > changes were made.
> >
> > The first "All-Section Sweepstakes" was held in 1930 and there were 68
> > sections. In addition to the sections we know today, there were some
> > interesting differences. Minnesota was orginally two sections - Northern
> > Minnesota and Southern Minnesota. Utah and Wyoming were originally one
> > section. The Philippines were a section (part of the Pacific Division).
> > But the most interesting section was probably Georgia-South Carolina-Isle
> > of Pines. The Isle of Pines is an island off the coast of Cuba (today
> > known as Isla de la Juventud or Isle of Youth). After the Spanish-American
> > War was concluded in 1898, the sovereignty of the island remained in
> > dispute, claimed by both the United States and independent Cuba. The
> > U.S. Senate ratified a treaty recognizing Cuban sovereignty over the
> > island in 1925. I have no idea why the Isle of Pines was still being
> > used in the section name as of 1930.
> >
> > Here are my notes for the last 40 years:
> >
> > 1 Jan 1973 Eastern Florida (EFL) deleted 76
> > Western Florida (WFL) deleted
> > Northern Florida (NFL) created
> > Southern Florida (SFL) created
> >
> > 1 Oct 1979 Canal Zone (KZ5) deleted 76
> >
> > 1 Jan 1987 West Texas (WTX) created from counties previously 75
> > assigned to North Texas (NTX) and South Texas (STX)
> >
> > Aug(?) 1988 West Indies (WI) deleted 76
> > Puerto Rico (PR) section created
> > Virgin Islands (VI) section created
> > Guantanamo Bay assigned to Virgin Islands section
> >
> > 6 Feb 1989 Washington (WA) deleted 77
> > Eastern Washington (EWA) created
> > Western Washington (WWA) created
> >
> > 1 Jan 1996 Northern New York (NNY) created from counties 78
> > previously assigned to Western New York (WNY)
> >
> > 1 Apr 1996 Two counties (Herkimer and Otsego) assigned to 78
> > the newly-created Northern New York (NNY) section
> > are returned to the Western New York (WNY)
> > section
> >
> > 1 Jan 1998 Newfoundland-Labrador section (NL) created, 79
> > removing that province from the Maritimes (MAR)
> > section
> >
> > 15 Jan 2000 West Central Florida (WCF) created from counties 80
> > previously assigned to Northern Florida (NFL)
> > and Southern Florida (SFL)
> >
> > 12 Sep 2012 Ontario (ON) deleted 83
> > Greater Toronto Area (GTA) created
> > Ontario East (ONE) created
> > Ontario North (ONN) created
> > Ontario West (ONW) created
> >
> > --
> > Kenneth E. Harker WM5R
> > kenharker at kenharker.com
> > http://www.kenharker.com/
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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>
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--
Kenneth E. Harker WM5R
kenharker at kenharker.com
http://www.kenharker.com/
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