Success!
Thanks for the suggestions.
I adapted an idea posted on Kwachon's link and came up with what turned out to be a very easy solution.
From frustration to solution in less than 40 minutes. Isn't PPRuNe wonderful.
In case the question is asked by someone in the future, I did this:
- Add a column
- Insert the formula =YEAR(G2) where G is the Date column
- Block copy the formula down the entire new column.
- Sort by the new column.
That formula obviously copies only the year, so sorting by the new column leaves days/months out of sequence but I don't need them in chronological order for my purposes, just the years.