[LCC] Fwd: Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas and Tennessee QSO Party

[w5wz at w5wz.com]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas and Tennessee QSO Party
Date: 2019-09-23 14:43
 From: w5wz at w5wz.com
To: arsk5db at gmail.com, w5xx at vicksburg.com, w9wi at gmail.com

Ralph K5DB
Malcolm W5XX
Douglas W9WI

Gentlemen,

Hello from Louisiana.  I'm Scott Dickson, W5WZ, a founding member of the 
Louisiana Contest Club and the current president.  The LCC sponsors the 
Louisiana QSO Party.

Over the past several years, participation in the Louisiana QSO Party 
has been in serious decline, both in-state and out-of-state 
participation.  Several of us have been kicking around ideas to foster 
participation, and an idea was floated that I wanted to open a dialog 
with you.

The idea is that of a "Delta Division" QSO Party, with AR, LA, MS and TN 
participating in a larger event, somewhat like the 7QP.  Or, some other 
merging of on-air activity to foster increased participation inside and 
outside of the grouping of states.

The LAQP struggles, perhaps in part, to sharing a weekend with the BARTG 
RTTY and the RUSSIAN DX contests (years ago, the LAQP was in September). 
  At the very least, we'd consider moving our contest date to coincide 
with the current AR or MS QSO party.


I welcome your thoughts and comments on the matter at hand.

--Scott, W5WZ
--w5wz at w5wz.com


And the response from Mississippi, W5XX:

Hello Scott,

Thanks for the note.  I was Chairman of the Delta Division QSO Party 
from
about 1976 through 1983. At that time Mississippi did not have a QSO 
Party
(the first MSQP died in the late 1960's), but the other three states 
did.
I tried to reactivate the Mississippi QSO Party, but did not get much
support. So, I got together with the Delta Division Director W4WHN and
started the Delta Division QSO Party.  Unfortunately, I didn't much
participation from any of the states.  It seems that most of the 
potential
participants from states that had QSO Parties wanted to spend their time
in their own State QSO parties. As a result the Delta Division QSO Party
died.

Currently Tennessee has a monster QSO party. I made over 100 Q's on 
Labor
Day weekend. Mississippi is doing OK. About 125 logs received, although
during the Sunspot Peak, I had over 175 logs received.. As for 
Louisiana,
the only recent comment I heard was from W3DYA/M, who said activity was
bad news. I don't know anything about Arkansas.

With the exception of California, Washington, Texas, Florida, Georgia, 
and
Tennessee (and maybe a few more) it seems like interest in QSO Parties 
has
dropped, especially in the smaller ham population states. I got in the
Alabama, Iowa and New Jersey QSO Parties this last weekend and activity
was not good.

Anyway scheduling the LAQP the same weekend as the MSQP is not a good 
idea
since people would get two five area QSO Parties mixed up, and Missouri 
is
the same weekend and until this year also Montana.

I have the advantage in Mississippi of having strong support from the 
599
DX Association and the Magnolia DX Association which results in a lot of
activity. I also call people on the phone the weekend before the QSO 
Party
to get them motivated, which has been successful to some extent.

Best 73 de W5XX