Below are six trivia questions. If you’d like to participate, you can either reply to this e-mail or submit your answers via Google Forms by using the button below. You can find our rules and guidelines by following this link.
1) Identify the slang term omitted in the following passage from a 1933 article representing what is believed to be the first time the term was used with this meaning in print: “A Hollywood soda-jerker forwards this glossary of soda-fountain lingo out there … ‘Shoot one’ and ‘Draw one’ is one coke and one coffee … ‘Shoot one in the red!’ means a cherry coke … An ‘echo’ is a repeat order … ‘[BLANK]’ means all out of it.”
2) WHAT film is missing from the following chronological and otherwise complete list of feature films directed by a particular director, shortened to the initials of the titles of the films? A3, [BLANK], TG, FC, PR, Z, TCCOBB, TSN, TGWTDT, GG, M. (Remember, name the film.)
3) Mily Balakirev, César Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and Alexander Borodin are sometimes called the “Mighty Handful” of prominent nineteenth-century Russian composers. Another name for the group is the “Пятёрка,” a word meaning WHAT?
4) WHAT is the atomic number of the element, used in medications for bipolar disorder, that is the least dense of all elements that are solid at room temperature?
5) In September 2020, Breonna Taylor became the second person ever to be featured alone on the cover of WHAT monthly magazine that had been published since April 2000? (Unrelatedly, the final issue of the magazine was released in December 2020.)
6) WHAT word completes the theme of this newsletter?
Trivia Newsletter CLIII Recap
1) The five folks shown in the image below generally go by WHAT title?
Each of these is an INSPECTOR. Going in clockwise order starting from the top right:
Inspector Clouseau, associated with the Pink Panther franchise.
Inspector Lestrade, associated with the Sherlock Holmes works.
Inspector Javert, from Les Misérables.
Inspector Palmu, from a popular Finnish book and film series.
Inspector Zenigata, an antagonist in the manga Lupin the Third.
2) In June 2021, following months of deliberation, the Board of Trustees of WHAT university located in Lexington, Virginia decided by a 22-6 vote not to change its name?
This is WASHINGTON & LEE UNIVERSITY. The “Lee” in Washington & Lee is Robert E. Lee, who was the university’s president immediately following the conclusion of the Civil War. “The name ‘Washington and Lee’ does not define us,” wrote the University’s president following the decision not to change the name. “We define it,” which I guess is one of those things you have to say because what else are you going to say?
By the way—Lexington, VA, which was named after Lexington, Massachusetts (of “Lexington and Concord” fame, for you American Revolution fans) is home to W&L and notably to WHAT OTHER COLLEGE, once called by Abraham Lincoln “the West Point of the South?” The answer is at the end of this newsletter.1
3) Give the first, middle, or last name, or title of the character from the novel Catch-22 who “had three strikes on him from the beginning—his mother, his father and Henry Fonda, to whom he bore a sickly resemblance almost from the moment of his birth.”
This character is MAJOR MAJOR MAJOR and his title is MAJOR.
The quote “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them” is from Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. Joseph Heller, the author of Catch-22, borrows it to describe Major Major in the lines preceding what we excerpted in the question:
Major Major had been born too late and too mediocre. Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity, and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them. With Major Major it had been all three. Even among men lacking all distinction he inevitably stood out as a man lacking more distinction than all the rest, and people who met him were always impressed by how unimpressive he was.
Something that people rarely tell you about many of the “great works of literature” is how funny they are. From the same chapter of Catch-22:
Major Major’s father was a sober God-fearing man whose idea of a good joke was to lie about his age. He was a long-limbed farmer, a God-fearing, freedom-loving, law-abiding rugged individualist who held that federal aid to anyone but farmers was creeping socialism. He advocated thrift and hard work and disapproved of loose women who turned him down. His specialty was alfalfa, and he made a good thing out of not growing any. The government paid him well for every bushel of alfalfa he did not grow. The more alfalfa he did not grow, the more money the government gave him, and he spent every penny he didn’t earn on new land to increase the amount of alfalfa he did not produce. Major Major’s father worked without rest at not growing alfalfa. On long winter evenings he remained indoors and did not mend harness, and he sprang out of bed at the crack of noon every day just to make certain that the chores would not be done. He invested in land wisely and soon was not growing more alfalfa than any other man in the county. Neighbors sought him out for advice on all subjects, for he had made much money and was therefore wise. “As ye sow, so shall ye reap,” he counseled one and all, and everyone said, “Amen.”
Major Major’s father was an outspoken champion of economy in government, provided it did not interfere with the sacred duty of government to pay farmers as much as they could get for all the alfalfa they produced that no one else wanted or for not producing any alfalfa at all.
4) WHAT word, which can also describe a type of writing desk, was originally used in English to refer to a person entrusted with confidential information? Those with this career in modern times may also be privy to confidential matters.
The word here is SECRETARY. A secretary desk is one of these things:
To quote Haggard Hawks:
The word SECRETARY originally referred to someone entrusted with keeping secrets. The modern meaning developed because these secret-keepers tended to be close attendants or assistants employed by powerful people.
5) As the titles of their television shows state, Harvey Birdman (2000-2007) and She-Hulk (2022) share WHAT one-word profession?
Each of Harvey Birdman and She-Hulk is an ATTORNEY.
Goodman, Lieber, Kurtzberg & Holliway is the name of the law firm (both in the comics and television show) at which She-Hulk works. Holden Holliway, the last named partner, is a She-Hulk character. The other names are references to some of the key figures in the history of Marvel Comics: Martin Goodman was the first publisher of Marvel Comics, Stan Lee’s birth name was Stanley Lieber, and Jack Kirby’s birth name was Jacob Kurtzberg.
6) Specifically WHAT word could follow each of the answers to the questions in this newsletter?
The answer here is GENERAL, as the word “general” can follow each of inspector, major, secretary, and attorney to make a common title or phrase, and Washington & Lee University participates in sports as the Generals, so they are the Washington & Lee Generals.
The newsletter title (“He's Spinning the Ball on His Finger! Just Take It!”) is, as it sometimes is around here, a Simpsons reference meant to help you get you to the Washington Generals, the longtime opponent of the Harlem Globetrotters. Back when Deadspin was good, one of its best articles was about the Washington Generals and a time that they defeated the Globetrotters.
Question #6 Leaderboard
The Question #6 leaderboard can be viewed at this link.
The college in Lexington that we asked about is the VIRGINIA MILITARY INSTITUTE.