The Big Book of American Trivia
Page 29
17. Idaho [Back]
18. Antarctica, about as far-off as you can get [Back]
19. Philadelphia [Back]
20. The Mall of America, in Minnesota [Back]
21. Yachts [Back]
22. Mary Pickford, who was still playing girls (and sometimes boys) when in her twenties [Back]
23. A chameleon, specifically, the American chameleon [Back]
24. Americium [Back]
You’re a Grand Old Anthem // Answers
1. The War of 1812, which (despite its name) lasted until 1815; Key wrote his poem the night of September 13–14, 1814. [Back]
2. Baltimore, where Fort McHenry is located [Back]
3. Great Britain; Key was being held on a British ship when the bombardment of Fort McHenry occurred. [Back]
4. Lawyer [Back]
5. Artillery shells, not “bombs” in the modern sense; Key literally wrote his poem by the light of the bombs and rockets. [Back]
6. Supposedly he was the first person to sing “The Star-Spangled Banner” in public, performing it often at a tavern in Baltimore. [Back]
7. A Greek poet known for his poems about wine and women [Back]
8. He was probably the composer of “To Anacreon in Heaven,” the tune used for “The Star-Spangled Banner.” [Back]
9. John Adams; the tune “To Anacreon in Heaven” had been used for the song “Adams and Liberty,” and there is no doubt Francis Scott Key was familiar with that song. [Back]
10. Fifteen, the number of states at that time [Back]
11. She and her assistants made the flag—thirty feet by forty-two feet—that Key saw flying over Fort McHenry. [Back]
12. The Armistead family, who owned the flag for three generations, gave away snippets of it as souvenirs. [Back]
13. The Smithsonian Institution [Back]
14. John Philip Sousa [Back]
15. Herbert Hoover, who signed the act of Congress into law in March 1931 [Back]
16. “In God we trust.” To be precise, line six of the fourth stanza is “And this be our motto, ‘In God is our trust.’” The popularity of the song led to the eventual adoption of “In God we trust” as the U.S. motto. [Back]
17. Whitney Houston [Back]
18. The National Museum of American History, where it was under restoration for ten years [Back]
19. Chesapeake Bay [Back]
20. Roseanne Barr [Back]
21. Members of the military, who are expected to salute [Back]
22. Buckingham Palace, at the Changing of the Guard; the performance was to show Britain’s solidarity with the United States after the 9/11 attacks. [Back]
23. Jehovah’s Witnesses [Back]
24. 1918 [Back]
25. Leslie Nielsen [Back]
Grand Old Flags // Answers
1. Flag Day, what else? [Back]
2. “Stars and Stripes Forever” [Back]
3. The Washington Monument [Back]
4. Virginia’s; the female figure is actually an Amazon warrior woman, trampling on a tyrant. The state motto is Sic semper tyrannis—“Thus always to tyrants” (in other words, “Don’t mess with us Virginia folks”). [Back]
5. New Mexico’s [Back]
6. Two new stars and stripes for the new states, Vermont and Kentucky [Back]
7. Alaska’s [Back]
8. Don’t Tread on Me—the words appeared near a rattlesnake [Back]
9. Alabama [Back]
10. The White House [Back]
11. The Confederacy’s [Back]
12. The Capitol [Back]
13. Idaho [Back]
14. “You’re a Grand Old Flag”; “rag” was considered a little derogatory. [Back]
15. Baton Rouge [Back]
16. Delaware [Back]
17. The Confederate battle flag [Back]
18. She made the American flag that flew over Fort McHenry when Francis Scott Key wrote “The Star-Spangled Banner.” [Back]
19. The Confederate States of America, which made a few unsuccessful excursions into the Southwest [Back]
20. Fort McHenry, whose bombardment led Francis Scott Key to write “The Star-Spangled Banner” [Back]
21. Mexico’s [Back]
22. Betsy Ross, maker of the first American flag [Back]
23. The U.S.’s [Back]
24. Over the body’s left shoulder [Back]
25. Memorial Day [Back]
26. France, which had done everything possible to encourage American independence from England [Back]
27. Divided We Fall [Back]
28. The Confederate battle flag [Back]
Famous Firsts // Answers
1. She was the first (but not the last) homeschooled child to win the bee. [Back]
2. Cracker Barrel [Back]
3. Jack London, author of The Call of the Wild and White Fang [Back]
4. Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? [Back]
5. Toy Story [Back]
6. Statins, which lower cholesterol [Back]
7. The Grand Canyon [Back]
8. Chewing gum (Maybe it shouldn’t be considered food if it isn’t swallowed.) [Back]
9. The top of Mount Everest [Back]
10. The Boy Scouts of America; Mitchell organized the troop in 1909. [Back]
11. Yellowstone [Back]
12. Personal computer [Back]
13. The Winter Olympics, in 1932 [Back]
14. The North Pole [Back]
15. FieldTurf, which is more like natural grass than AstroTurf [Back]
16. Philadelphia [Back]
17. Huckleberry Hound [Back]
18. Speeding; he was traveling at (gasp!) 12 mph. [Back]
19. John Glenn, later a senator from Ohio [Back]
20. Alabama [Back]
21. Benjamin Franklin [Back]
22. Income taxes [Back]
23. New York City [Back]
24. A comic strip [Back]
25. A traffic light [Back]
26. Bulova; the commercial cost nine dollars. [Back]
27. Walt Disney [Back]
28. The atomic bomb, which was tested near the town [Back]
29. United States of America [Back]
30. Daylight Saving Time [Back]
31. Santa Claus [Back]
32. The cafeteria [Back]
33. John Dillinger [Back]
34. A telephone directory [Back]
35. Diners Club [Back]
36. Columbus, Ohio [Back]
37. New York, under the Hudson River [Back]
“You Can Quote Me on That” // Answers
1. Rush Limbaugh [Back]
2. The Declaration of Independence, penned by Thomas Jefferson [Back]
3. Jack LaLanne, who also said, “If man made it, don’t eat it.” [Back]
4. Thomas Edison [Back]
5. Hillary Clinton [Back]
6. Douglas MacArthur; he did. [Back]
7. Henry David Thoreau, author of Walden [Back]
8. Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, who defeated a British force on Lake Erie in the War of 1812 [Back]
9. Patrick Henry [Back]
10. Joan Rivers [Back]
11. Sean Hannity [Back]
12. Muhammad Ali [Back]
13. Henry Clay, who apparently was right, since he had no luck running for president [Back]
14. The Constitution; the words are from the Preamble. [Back]
15. “Elvis has left the building.” [Back]
16. Virginia’s [Back]
17. Porky Pig [Back]
18. Fulton J. Sheen [Back]
19. William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania [Back]
20. Red Skelton [Back]
21. Jimmy Durante [Back]
22. Ken Starr [Back]
23. Davy Crockett [Back]
24. Bugs Bunny [Back]
25. Charlton Heston [Back]
26. John Paul Jones [Back]
27. Knute Rockne of Notre Dame [Back]
28. Mae West [Back]
&n
bsp; 29. Father Edward Flanagan, founder of Boys Town [Back]
30. Walter Cronkite, who died in 2009 [Back]
31. Barry Goldwater [Back]
32. Brigham Young, who led the Mormons to Utah [Back]
33. Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address [Back]
34. The War of 1812 [Back]
35. Cigar; the statement is Marshall’s only claim to fame. [Back]
36. The New York Times [Back]
37. John L. Sullivan, the bare-knuckles Boston Strong Boy [Back]
38. Michael Medved [Back]
39. Destroy [Back]
Mottoes // Answers
1. In God We Trust, which appears on all coins [Back]
2. The FBI’s [Back]
3. RCA (Remember the dog listening to the phonograph?) [Back]
4. The Boy Scouts of America [Back]
5. The Camp Fire Girls [Back]
6. The Military Academy at West Point [Back]
7. Florida [Back]
8. The New York Times [Back]
9. Maryland’s; the motto Fati maschii, parole femine, was traditionally translated “Deeds are manly, words are womanly.” [Back]
10. Rhode Island [Back]
11. Ohio (It’s from the Bible, by the way: Matthew 19:26.) [Back]
12. Wisconsin’s [Back]
13. Arizona’s [Back]
14. Oklahoma [Back]
15. California; eureka means “I have found it.” [Back]
16. Minnesota’s [Back]
17. West Virginia’s [Back]
18. Memphis [Back]
Word and Phrase Origins // Answers
1. Frank Lloyd Wright [Back]
2. Ahoy; Thomas Edison coined hello, by the way. [Back]
3. Bayou [Back]
4. Carpetbaggers, from their cheap bags made of carpet [Back]
5. Veep; Barkley was veep from 1949 to 1953. [Back]
6. The Keys, off the tip of Florida [Back]
7. Oliver Wendell Holmes [Back]
8. Stonewalling (Remember Stonewall Jackson?) [Back]
9. Gobbledygook [Back]
10. Mark Twain, whose real name was Samuel Clemens [Back]
11. Beautiful, appropriately enough [Back]
12. “My name is mud.” The doctor unwittingly helped assassin John Wilkes Booth escape by treating Booth’s broken leg. Mudd knew nothing of what Booth had done, but he was imprisoned nonetheless. [Back]
13. United States of America [Back]
14. The Cajuns, a word that came from Acadians; forced out of Canada by the English, many settled in Louisiana. [Back]
15. Warren Harding; he should have said normality, but since he had presidential clout, his mistake became an acceptable word. [Back]
16. No one knows. [Back]
17. A locomotive; the term came to be used by many whites also. [Back]
18. Blue laws; no one is quite sure why. [Back]
19. “Table” or “tabletop,” referring to a flat-topped elevated area [Back]
20. Indian summer [Back]
Let’s Have a Contest! // Answers
1. Miss Congeniality [Back]
2. The Talladega (Alabama) Superspeedway, also known as “Dega” [Back]
3. Boston, Massachusetts [Back]
4. Bicycles; if you saw the movie Breaking Away, you’ll remember this. [Back]
5. The Pillsbury Bake-Off [Back]
6. The fence-painting contest and the frog-jumping contest (both inspired by incidents from Mark Twain’s books) [Back]
7. Canoes [Back]
8. Tobacco spitting [Back]
9. Pike’s Peak; the Pike’s Peak Marathon is not for the timid. [Back]
10. Washington; it combines logging contests with rodeos and is held in Sedro Woolley. [Back]
11. Ocean City; the contest is held every August. [Back]
12. Anchorage, Alaska [Back]
13. The Stampede and Suicide Race, held in August [Back]
14. Garlic; the cook-off is part of the annual Gilroy Garlic Festival. [Back]
15. Swimming, biking, and running [Back]
16. The All-American Soap Box Derby, held every August [Back]
17. New Mexico; the race also has contests for Duck Queen, Darling Duckling, and Best-Dressed Duck. [Back]
18. Pecos, Texas; it’s part of the annual West of the Pecos Rodeo. [Back]
19. Barbecue [Back]
20. Hot-air balloons; the town also has a balloon museum. [Back]
21. Sandcastles; it’s the U.S. Open Sandcastle Competition. [Back]
22. Long Beach, which hosts the Toyota Grand Prix every April [Back]
23. The Preakness [Back]