A few people have contacted me asking questions about the Ice-Out. As I reported earlier, the clock finally stopped Thursday night, April 17, at 8:41 p.m. I got word today that there is a winner, but his or her name will not be released right away - time is needed to verify, etc.
I can also tell you that 16,000 tickets were logged in - about evenly split between paper tickets and on-line tickets. The winner is apparently not local, at least the area code is upstate New York. The winner will receive about $7,800 and the Joe's Pond Association will receive the same!
Now to questions: "Curious" asked: Interested in knowing how 10,000 plus tickets are handled and sorted. Into a data base, by hand?
We have someone who logs the tickets onto a spreadsheet. How they are sorted depends on who is doing the logging in. We have had at least four or five different input specialists over the years. The very first was Jules Chatot who "logged" the names of ticket holders in a notebook he kept in his shirt pocket. That was when there were a few hundred tickets. Later, one of his daughters, Judee, did a spreadsheet (when computers were very new to most of us, around 1990). There were around 1500 tickets sold. That spreadsheet had not only the ticket number and the time and date of the guess, it also had the ticket holder's name, full address, and telephone number.
The game grew each year and in 1994, a "data specialist," Manuel "Chico" Carcoba was hired. Chico logged in tickets for a number of years, and eventually retired. There were a couple others before Joe's Ponder Henretta Splain took the job at least 10 years ago, I believe. Henretta retired last year and now Theresa Dimick is our data specialist.
How much information entered and in what order depends on who is doing the work. I can assure you that every ticket is seen and counted. There are always the jokers who enter silly names or pick dates in July or August, and while those tickets are appreciated and counted, they won't be on the spreadsheet. Sometimes there are problems with tickets that have unclear information or something is left out, and every effort is made to reach the person and resolve those.
The on-line sales each year amount to an increasingly large portion of the total sold. Those, too, are on a printout, and board members are responsible for searching them for possible winners once the clock stops.
Once the winning ticket(s) is found, it has to be verified by two or more committee or board members. The announcement of a winner or winners is not made until that person is located and dates and numbers verified.
Another reader asked: how deep is the water where the pallet is placed?? the clock should have come unplugged the same time the pallet was submerged !!!!
That's the way it should work in theory, but each year is different, and try as we may (and a lot of people have worked on this!) whatever setup is out there, things can change at the drop of temperature or the whim of Mother Nature. The flag is set up about 100 feet from shore where there is at least 10-15 feet of water. Over the years, different configurations have been tried to get just the right formula, but there are always variables like wind, weather, and water currents. If the rope is supported so it won't get frozen into the ice during warm/cold weather changes, there is always the risk that an errant snowmobiler might get tangled in it. Having it raised on stakes helps mitigate that danger, at least until after snowmobile season, but by the time it's unsafe for snowmobiles, there has been enough melting so the stakes fall and let the rope down. It is unsafe for anyone to go out on the ice to retrieve stakes or free the rope, so it boils down to simply being that whatever goes on, it is all part of the variables in the guessing game.
I want to wish everyone a very pleasant Easter Sunday tomorrow - I hope you are with friends or family. The weather is mellow today -very spring-like and will be very nice tomorrow, according to the forecast. The road crew worked on our road yesterday, so of course we got some rain last night and it is showery today. Honing the road before rain seems to be "normal" - but I'm pretty sure the road crew doesn't plan it that way. Nobody expects to have clean, mud-free vehicles during April anyway, and it's good to have at least some of the washboard areas and muddy spots fixed.
Travel safely, and Happy Easter.
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