Harrisburg, PA — The United States Harness Writers Association, the industry’s largest group of communicators, is celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2022, having started on May 8, 1947, and USHWA is planning the first of several commemorative activities and promotions by offering a handicapping contest through its relationship with Scott Alberg, with whom USHWA has been working on handicapping promotions on Alberg’s Facebook page, facebook.com/scott.alberg.3.

This $1,000 Superfecta Handicapping contest will take place on USHWA’s 75th “birthday,” Sunday (May 8), at the new Oak Grove Racetrack in Kentucky on the sixth race Open Handicap Trot.

Fans can enter the contest through Alberg’s Facebook page, or alternatively through CustomerService@4NJPicks.com, following the timetable posted on Alberg’s site. The object is to pick the first four finishers in the contest race in exact order.

A single correct entry wins that handicapper $1,000; if there are multiple correct selections, there will be a “shake” to determine the thousand-dollar winner. If nobody picks the Superfecta, there will be consolation prizes depending on the number of correct numbers from the top of the ticket.

There is a complete set of contest rules posted on Alberg’s website.

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The U. S. Harness Writers Association was founded after the races at Roosevelt Raceway on Thursday, May 8, 1947, “over hamburgers at a nearby location.” (Yonkers would not start racing until 1950.)

A dozen print reporters, a large number from Long Island, drew up an original set of bylaws, and the group was incorporated early in the summer of 1947, electing as its president Mike Lee of the Long Island Press (Jamaica, N.Y.). Lee served as president for the first 13 years of the organization; no president has ever served more than three ever since.

As harness racing grew in popularity in industrialized areas of the United States, new members were accepted in an “At-Large” category; as the sport continued its growth in the 1950s, local “chapters” were founded, of which there are currently 12, along with the “At-Large” designation for those not living in a concentrated bed of harness racing.

USHWAns supply the major source of voters for the sport’s highest honor, the Harness Racing Hall of Fame, and annually conducts the Dan Patch Awards banquet, which honors the best and brightest of the previous year’s North American racing.

A more detailed history of USHWA is available at this link.