page_title: Ken Westerfield
section_title: Awards, achievements and event timeline
hierarchical_section_title: Ken Westerfield / Awards, achievements and event timeline
caption_attribution_description: English: Ken Westerfield demonstrating the sidearm throw
context_page_description: Ken Westerfield is a pioneering Frisbee disc player.
  In the 1960s, as numbers of young people became alienated from social norms, they resisted and looked for alternatives. They formed what became known as the counterculture. The forms of escape and resistance manifest in many ways including social activism, alternative lifestyles, experimental living through foods, dress, music and alternative recreational activities, including that of throwing a Frisbee. Organized disc sports, began in the 1970s, with promotional efforts from Wham-O and Irwin Toy, a few tournaments and professionals using Frisbee show tours to perform at universities, fairs and sporting events. Disc sports such as freestyle, double disc court, guts, ultimate and disc golf became this sports first events. The team sport of disc ultimate and disc golf are popular worldwide and are now played semi-professionally. The World Flying Disc Federation, Professional Disc Golf Association, and the Freestyle Players Association are the official rules and sanctioning organizations for flying disc sports worldwide.
context_section_description: 1960 - Westerfield and Kenner, at age thirteen, become friends.
  1963–1965 - Westerfield and Kenner begin their free-form style of Frisbee play summer days at Silver lake and Cass Lake beaches through their high school years in Michigan.
  1965–1969 - Played Frisbee freestyle to crowds, while at various outdoor rock concerts and music festivals including Woodstock.
  1970 - Westerfield and Kenner move from Michigan to Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Play Frisbee freestyle and disc golf daily, in Queen's Park. This was one of the earliest designed object disc golf courses, along with Rochester, NY and Berkeley, CA. also designed in 1970.
  1971 - Hitchhiking across Canada, performed unsponsored improv Frisbee street shows with Kenner in cities along the way, including a summer of Frisbee shows in the historic area of Gastown, in Vancouver, British Columbia.
  1971 - Involved in the Vancouver Gastown Riots while doing Frisbee shows that same night  in the streets of  Gastown.
  1971–1974 - Living in the highly publicized notorious counter-cultural Rochdale College they performed nightly Frisbee shows on the Yonge Street Mall in Toronto, Ontario.
  1972–1976 - As the Canadian Frisbee Champions, Westerfield and Kenner, contracted by Irwin Toy, the Frisbee manufacturer in Canada, to perform Frisbee shows and promote the Jr Frisbee Program at special events across Canada.
  1972–1985 - The Canadian Open Frisbee Championships, Toronto (co-produced and was tournament director with Jim Kenner). Beginning as a guts and distance tournament, later adding freestyle, disc golf, ultimate and over-all individual field events. The Canadian Open and the Vancouver Open were the introduction of disc sports (up until then, the Frisbee was always considered a toy).
  1973 - Planned to introduce the first freestyle competition event at the 2nd annual Canadian Open Frisbee Championships in Toronto, but due to a lack of competitors, canceled the event. Wham-O in the U.S. sent Victor Malafronte and Jo Cahow to see this new freestyle event. It was the first time Westerfield and Kenner would see other highly skilled freestylers.
  1974 - Westerfield and Kenner introduce and win the first freestyle competition at the Canadian Open Frisbee Championships, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
  1974 - The Decade Awards 1970-1975, Awarded "Best Freestyle Routine", The 1974 Canadian Open, Ken Westerfield/Jim Kenner.
  1974–1979 - Clothing sponsored by Adidas Canada
  1974–1977 - Molson Frisbee Team, performing Frisbee freestyle shows with Jim Kenner at special events and Canadian universities in Ontario.
  1974–1977 - Westerfield and Kenner produced Western Canada's first Frisbee (disc sports) competitions. The Vancouver Open Frisbee Championships at Kitsilano Beach and a Wham-O/Irwin sponsored North American Series (NAS) Tournament in Stanley Park, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
  1975 - World MTA Record 15 seconds, Canadian Open Frisbee Championships, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
  1975 - Voted Best Men's Player, Ken Westerfield, The Decade Awards 1970-1975.
  1975 - The Canadian Open Frisbee Championships introduces disc ultimate as a showcase event. Westerfield played in these beginning exhibitions along with some of the sports founders (Johnny Appleseeds) from Columbia High School (CHS), Maplewood, New Jersey.
  1975 - Introduced a new freestyle move called a "body-roll" (rolling the disc across outstretched arms and chest or back), at the American Flying Disc Open (AFDO), in Rochester, New York.
  1975–1978 - Signature endorsing the Canadian World Class Frisbee.
  1976 - Presents the first disc golf tournaments in Canada, first as an object course, then using disc pole holes with chains and baskets. Canadian Open Frisbee Championships on Toronto Islands and the Vancouver Open Frisbee Championships, Vancouver, BC ( 1977, Wham-O, NAS event in Stanley Park using natural objects).
  1976 - Vancouver BC, appearing on the Peter Gzowski television show along with Greenpeace activist/founder David McTaggart. The next day was invited by Mctaggart to do a Frisbee show at a Greenpeace rally/protest on Kitsilano B
caption: Westerfield demonstrating his sidearm throwing style, the 1970s
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