New England Hall of Fame
/Jim Hanson//

Organizer
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2004
Jim Hanson started playing Horseshoes in 1974 while organizing and running a non-sanctioned league in Malden MA. The League was known as Horseshoe Haven, active from 1974 thru 1999, 25 years. An Average of 15 players was NHPA cardholders. For three of those years Jim brought that league thru winter play at the Hamilton Club Winter courts in Peabody MA till they lost the site. Jim joined the NHPA in 1989.

Jim Hanson is well known to most New England players as the man with the Stats. In 1993 Jim took over as statistician for All New England States. Upon taking this responsibility, he had to go back and post the previous year of 1992 also to have a Database (prior data was typed). This means Jim has been compiling this data for us for 12 years.

Jim has been a member of the NHPA for about 16 years, pitching himself in a total of 201 tournaments. His own (high three average) in tournaments, he claims at best was about 37%. Jim is a regular score keeper, scoring for us in both the morning and afternoon tournaments EVEN since he has stopped pitching! He is often seen helping or entering our games during a tournament if needed and has even been known to bring his own computer equipment and printer to see a tournament is held.

Jim has been the New England Vice-President 12 years. One of the duties is to present the Most Improved player Award. This year Jim is responsible for bringing into play Two most improved awards: one award for Most Improved Short distance pitcher and the other award for the Most Improved Long distance pitcher. Another duty of the vice-president is to maintain stats for all New England Pitchers. This gives each player the fairest opportunity in each class to win and also many playoff games.

Each year at the New England Championship games Jim hands us, (over 330 pitchers) a paper recording our individual progress for at least the last two years. He has maintained records of each of our individual stats going back about 12 years.

Jim Hanson promotes the game of horseshoes daily! In 1997 he built the New England Horseshoe Web-site for our enjoyment. This web site includes graphic artwork and photos of many tournament sites. It includes information on directions to tournaments, tournament classes, tournament stats, and information on tournament winners. The site has well over 1300 separate files. Jim spends enormous amounts of time reviewing information, entering information, posting and updating information for our pleasure and knowledge of the game.

Jim Hanson has earned the right to be in the New England Hall of Fame by promoting the game of horseshoes wherever he goes! Jim loves helping others but seldom gets the recognition he deserves; therefore it is a great pleasure to induct Jim Hanson into the New England Hall of Fame as an Organizer.