The Adventures of EPCOT Center Sweepstakes

In 1984, newspapers and radio stations across the U.S. were giving away trips to EPCOT Center.

I loved contests and sweepstakes as a kid. Whenever the opportunity arose, especially when no purchase was necessary, I found myself filling out entry forms and begging my mother for a stamp so I could send it in. Sadly, I never won any of these contests, but that didn’t reduce the excitement of participating. My contest entries were an affordable fantasy, and my thoughts about them usually didn’t extend too far after entering. Occasionally, though, a contest would run longer or have a prize that captured my imagination. That is exactly what happened when one of my local papers started running the Adventures of EPCOT Center Sweepstakes.

The contest ran in various newspapers across the United States in the spring of 1984, but I played it in the New York Daily News after seeing commercials for it on local TV. It was convenient for me to enter since my family had a subscription to the paper. All I needed to do was pay attention to the date and make sure I started holding onto the paper when the contest began. On April 30th, I learned that you could get an official entry form in the Sunday paper on May 6th.

On the 6th, I got up, ran to the front door, and got the paper. It took me a few minutes, but I found the entry form and the details on how to enter the sweepstakes. It was easy. Every day of the week, they would give you an EPCOT-centric clue either in the Daily News or on WOR radio. Then you just put the clue into the official entry blanks and mail it in. You could enter as often as you liked, and no purchase was necessary. So I could take this entry blank, hand copy it, and send that in as well, which I did. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to enter the contest under my own name since I was under 18, but I convinced my mom to let me put her name on it, and we were off to the races.

They included a map of EPCOT Center that they claimed you could use as a key to answer daily clues. Now, I hadn’t seen the clues yet, so I thought I would need to match something on the map or maybe solve some sort of puzzle and compare it to the map. Fortunately for me, it was a lot easier.

What did the clues look like? They were not mysterious at all and could not be clearer. They were either a country in World Showcase or a pavilion in Future World. You didn’t need to decipher anything. Instead, you had a clear image of the clue, the name of the clue, and a short description of it. They even described them as Clue/Answers.

Why did they make it so simple? Maybe they wanted to keep entry to the contest as easy as possible. Perhaps it had something to do with giving clues in print vs. on the radio. Whatever the case, this made it just a collecting game, and even at a young age, I knew I could handle that. Here are the 5 entries for Week 1 of the contest.

This contest would continue for multiple weeks. Each week would be different, and you could fill out a different entry blank if you wanted to. If you had already completed Week 1, I am not sure why you would continue to fill out different entries. Instead, the multi-week contest allowed people who missed an earlier week to continue to enter. They did mention that there were exciting Grand Prizes (plural). So possibly each week allowed another shot at the big prize? It is unclear. I only did the first week and entered multiple times off that entry.

Around the same time I discovered the contest, they started running commercials for it on television and the radio. I was already pretty excited seeing this in the paper, but seeing it in full-color TV made my excitement go way up.

What could you win?

What I wanted was the non-transferable, no substitution grand prize of a 5-day, 4-night trip to the Walt Disney World Vacation Kingdom. The trip was locked in so you would depart on September 27 and return on October 1, 1984. The trip was for a family of 4, and they would fly you via Eastern Airlines to Orlando, where you would stay in the Hilton at the Walt Disney World Village Hotel Plaza.

That was the Grand Prize, but what else could you win?

• Gold Sampler Tea Sets from Twinings Teas

• 1/2 ounce bottles of Fidji Perfume from Guy La Roche

• Lambswool sweaters from Pringle of Scotland

• $50.00 Gift Certificates from I Santi Leather Goods for their Manhattan Store

• Gift sets of Bahlsen cookies

• $25.00 Gift Certificates from Mitsukoshi for their Manhattan Store

• M.I. Hummel figurines from Hummel

• This is a pretty worldly selection of prizes. I think they were going for a World Showcase theme, which is a nice touch.

Did I win?

Each morning, I woke up with a sense of purpose, eager to find the next clue and piece it together with the map. It wasn't just about the potential trip to Disney World, it was about the journey of participation, the conversations it sparked with my family, and the sense of being part of something bigger. Despite multiple entries and a lot of enthusiasm, I did not win The Adventures of EPCOT Center Sweepstakes.

This made me sad at the time because, like any contest I took seriously, I was 100% sure that I was going to win. Even though it didn’t happen, it was still fun. My family was already getting the paper, and for the price of some diligence and a couple of stamps, I bought a dream. One where my family would be whisked away to sunny Florida to bask in the technological futurism and world-spanning wonder of EPCOT Center.