1.This man’s father, a well-connected Democratic judge, got him a job working for US Attorney Irving Saypol in New York. He rose to fame with his prosecution of William Remington and his cross-examination of Ethel Rosenberg’s brother. He is a character in the play G. David Schine in Hell by Tony Kushner, and his battle with AIDS is dramatized in Kushner’s more famous play Angels in America. FTP, name this closeted homosexual who served as Joseph McCarthy’s chief counsel during several anti-communist hearings in the 1950’s.
Answer: Roy Cohn
2.While a member of the Politburo, he and Lavrenty Beria joined forces to purge the supporters of Andrei Zhdanov. He remained in the successor to the Politburo, the Presidium, until being forced to resign in 1957 for being part of the “Anti-Party Group” that opposed Khruschev. He was expelled from the Communist Party in 1961 and spent the rest of his life managing a hydroelectric plant in Kazakhstan. FTP, name this man who served as premier of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1955, the successor to Joseph Stalin and the predecessor of Nikolai Bulganin.
Answer: Georgy Malenkov
3.From 1940-41 and again from 1944-45, he was the “Baby of the House,” the title given to the youngest member of the British Parliament. He spent several decades as the chief fundraiser for the London charity Toynbee Hall. He was married to actress Valerie Hobson from 1954 until her 1998 death, despite being forced to admit in 1963 to having had an affair with Christine Keeler. FTP, name this subject of the movie Scandal, the onetimeUK Secretary of State for War whose affair brought down the Conservative government of Harold McMillan.
Answer: John Profumo
4.In 1955, Governor Orval Faubus appointed him chairman of the Arkansas Industrial Development Commission (AIDC). His first campaign to unseat Faubus failed in 1964; however, in 1966 he succeeded and became Arkansas’ first Republican governor since Reconstruction. He served two terms and succeeded in instituting prison reform and widespread integration. He and his brother were the first siblings to be governors of two different states simultaneously, and his namesake son is now Lieutenant Governor of Arkansas. FTP, name this scion of the Standard Oil family, brother of Nelson and son of John D.
Answer: WinthropRockefeller(prompt on “Rockefeller”)
5.In 1953, Michael DeBakey used it to build artificial arteries. Now used in everything from bow strings to aquarium nets, its name is a registered trademark of INVISTA, a division of Koch industries. It was first developed by DuPont in Seaford, Delaware, under the name “Fiber V.” Formed by a condensation reaction of ethylene glycol and terephthalic acid, its full chemical name is polyethylene terephthalate. FTP, name this common polyester.
Answer: Dacron (accept full chemical name before it is mentioned; prompt on “PET, PETE, or PETP”)
6.Allison MacKenzie is a teenager who dreams of becoming a novelist. Her mother, Connie, is hiding the secret of Allison’s illegitimate birth. Selena Cross, Connie’s employee and Allison’s best friend, is raped and impregnated by her stepfather, whom she then kills and buries in a sheep pen. Allison eventually does write a book, but it is never published because her agent abandons her after taking her virginity. FTP, all these things happen in what 1956 trashy best-seller by Grace Metalious, which was adapted into a 1957 film and a 1960s ABC soap opera?
Answer: Peyton Place
7.He was born with a mild birth defect that misshaped his legs, and was frequently picked on as a boy. He developed an obsession with James Dean and deliberately groomed and dressed himself to look like him. While robbing a Nebraska gas station in 1957, he killed Robert Colvert. On January 28, 1958, he killed his girlfriend’s mother, sister, and stepfather, and then killed seven more people over the next three days before being captured by a massive manhunt. FTP, name this serial killer, whose fugitive killing spree with girlfriend Caril Ann Fugate inspired the movies Badlands and Natural Born Killers.
Answer: Carl Starkweather
8.A neighbor of Alexander Scriabin, he was originally inspired to be a composer and studied music before switching to philosophy and then poetry. He rose to fame with the lyric cycle Rupture and the collections Early Trains, The Second Birth, and My Sister Life, and he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1958 but refused to accept it out of fear of losing his Soviet citizenship. However, he isbest known in the West for his only novel, the story of Yuri and Lara, which was not published in his homeland until 1987. FTP, name this Russian author ofDoctor Zhivago.
Answer: Boris Pasternak
9.After he had worked as an editor on two Michael Powell films, Noel Coward partnered with him to co-direct In Which We Serve in 1942. Early successes included Blithe Spirit, Brief Encounter, and Great Expectations, but after Pauline Kael’s vitriolic review of Ryan’s Daughter in 1970 he became discouraged and only made one more film. In the British Film Institute’s list of the top 100 British films of all time, he directed 3 of the top 5. FTP, name this epic filmmaker who won Oscars for The Bridge on the River Kwai and Lawrence of Arabia.
Answer: David Lean
10.Born in 1913 in Brest-Litovsk, he was heavily influenced by Vladimir Jabotinsky. In 1948, he was on board the Altalena when it was sunk while carrying arms. As leader of Irgun, he plotted to kill Ernest Bevin and planned the bombing of the KingDavidHotel in 1946. In 1948 he founded the right-wing political party Herut, which became the core of the much larger Likud. In 1977 Likud won a majority in the Knesset and he became the sixth Prime Minister of Israel. FTP, name this man who co-won the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize with Anwar Sadat for signing the Camp David Accords.
Answer: Menachem Begin
11.In 1970, while in ManilaInternationalAirport, a Bolivian painter named Benjamin Mendoza tried to stab him with a kris. Born Giovanni Montini, he was made Archbishop of Milan in 1953. Known as the “Pilgrim Pope,” he traveled to five continents and met with the Patriarch of Constantinople in 1964 to rescind the excommunications of the Great Schism of 1054. His best-known act is the condemnation of birth control as a sin in the Humanae Vitae of 1968. FTP, name this successor to John XXIII.
Answer: Pope Paul VI(accept birth name before it is mentioned)
12.He is reported to have said, “Why are you here? My city is in chaos because of you.” The British tabloid Sunday Express dubiously identified him as a 19-year-old student. In 2006, a producer for the PBS series Frontline showed Jeff Widener’s iconic photograph of him to a group of students at BeijingUniversity, who did not recognize where it came from. In 1992, Jiang Zemin said of him to Barbara Walters, “I think never killed [sic].” FTP, name this solitary Chinese hero who, on June 5, 1989, stood in the Avenue of Everlasting Peace and blocked a column of oncoming military vehicles from entering Tiananmen Square.
Answer: Tank Man (accept clear knowledge equivalents)
13.Born in Oregon in 1927, he became deaf in his right ear after landing on it during a blanket toss gone wrong. A later operation left him deaf in both ears, and he often performed with a visible hearing aid. He had major hits in 1951 with the double-sided record “Cry”/”The Little White Cloud That Cried,” and in 1954 he appeared opposite Ethel Merman and Marilyn Monroe in There’s No Business Like Show Business. FTP, name this popular crooner of the 1950s whose other hits include the duet “Candy Lips” with Doris Day and “Just Walking in the Rain.”
Answer: Johnnie Ray
14.In 1981, he lost his right hand in an assassination attempt when a bomb concealed in a tape recorder exploded below him during a press conference. He replaced Hossein-Ali Montazeri as Tehran’s Friday Prayer Leader in 1979. After the 1981 assassination of Mohammad Ali Rajai, he won 95% of the vote and so became Iran’s president, a post he held until 1989. FTP, name this man who in that year replaced Ruhollah Khomeini as the Supreme Leader of Iran.
Answer: Ayatollah Ali Khamenei(prompt on “Ayatollah”; do not accept “Khomeini”)
15.Somewhat ironically, he is a staunch Republican who served as an advisor to Jesse Helms and opposed South African sanctions and making Martin Luther King’s birthday a holiday. In 1966, he was wounded by a sniper during the “March Against Fear” from Memphis to Jackson, Mississippi. He attended Jackson State College for two years, but he is more famous for defying Governor Ross Barnett and, in 1962, becoming the first black student at the University of Mississippi. FTP, name this ambivalent civil rights pioneer.
Answer: James Meredith
16.Born in 1921 in Philadelphia, he played in every All-Star Game from 1949 to 1957 and was the National League’s Most Valuable Player in 1951, 1953, and 1955. He played all ten seasons of his major league baseball career with the Brooklyn Dodgers, and in 1972 his number, 39, was retired by them (now in Los Angeles). FTP, name this second African American to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, a star catcher who was permanently disabled in a car accident in 1958.
Answer: Roy Campanella
17.Born in Madrid, Spain, in 1863, he studied with William James and Josiah Royce at Harvard before graduating and becoming a professor there, teaching such students as T.S. Eliot and Wallace Stevens. His 1935 memoir The Last Puritan was written in the form of a novel and became a best-seller, but he is better remembered for his philosophical works such as The Sense of Beauty, The Life of Reason, and The Realms of Being. FTP, name this man who informed us that, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
Answer: George Santayana (Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana)
18.It was written in 1952 by Max C. Freedman and James E. Myers, the latter writing under the name “Jimmy DeKnight,” and it was first recorded by Sonny Dae & His Knights. A version produced by Billy Crystal’s uncle was issued in 1954 by Decca Records as the B-side to “Thirteen Women (and Only One Man in Town),” but it did not take off in popularity until used in the 1955 film Blackboard Jungle. Later, it became the theme for American Graffiti and the first season of Happy Days. FTP, name this rock ‘n’ roll classic by Bill Haley and the Comets.
Answer: (We’re Gonna) Rock Around the Clock
19.Its detailed description of a waterbed, when such a device did not actually exist, was ruled to be “prior art” by the US Patent Office. It inspired the creation of the real-life “Church of All Worlds” and introduced the work “grok.” The hero of this novel is rescued from a hospital by Gillian Boardman and moves in with millionaire writer Jubal Hershaw. FTP, name this Hugo-winning science fiction work about Martian Valentine Michael Smith, written by Robert Heinlein.
Answer: Stranger in a Strange Land
20.He won his first sixteen profession bouts by knockout. In 1951, he defeated his childhood idol Joe Louis on national television in what would be Louis’ last fight. In 1952, he knocked out Jersey Joe Walcott in a fight that lasted thirteen rounds to become World Heavyweight Champion. In 1954, his legendary match against Ezzard Charles went a full fifteen rounds. In his last match, he defeated Light Heavyweight world champion Archie Moore and then retired with a 49-0 professional record. FTP, name this only undefeated heavyweight champion of boxing.
Answer: Rocky Marciano
21.Sunday, April 24, 1960, was nicknamed after this man. Born in 1906 in Poland, he came to the US in 1921 and joined the staff of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital in 1939, where there is now a conference center named after him. During the 1950’s he carried many experiments with live viruses, and in 1957 the World Health Organization allowed him to test the vaccine he had developed on children around the world. FTP, name this inventor of the oral polio vaccine.
Answer: Albert Sabin
1.Answer these questions about the United Arab Republic FTPE.
F5PE, what two countries signed a pact in 1958 to become the United Arab Republic?
Answer: Egypt and Syria
The flag of the UAR was red, white, and black horizontal stripes with two green stars. What country’s flag is identical except that it has three stars and the words “Allahu Akbar” written in Arabic?
Answer: Iraq
In 1958, President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent troops to this country to support President Camille Chamoun against threats from the UAR.
Answer: Lebanon
2.Like Roy Cohn, he continued to deny that he was homosexual even as he succumbed to AIDS.
FTP, name this popular pianist and television star who played the Batman villain Chandell.
Answer: Liberace
Liberace claimed that his favorite song was “The Quest (The Impossible Dream)” from this 1965 Broadway musical.
Answer: Man of La Mancha
Liberace was advised to use only his last name by this family friend, a fellow pianist and the third Prime Minister of Poland.
Answer: Ignace Paderewski
3.FTPE, name the actor from a song that they famously performed in a movie.
“Que Será, Será” in Alfred Hitchcock’s The Man Who Knew Too Much
Answer: Doris Day
“Luck Be a Lady” in Guys and Dolls
Answer: Marlon Brando (do not accept “Frank Sinatra”)
“Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid
Answer: Bob Dylan
4.FTPE, name these figures involved in Watergate.
This security guard, who played himself in the film All the President’s Men, called the police on the night of the Watergate break-in.
Answer: Frank Wills
Known as “Maximum John,” this man was the judge in the trial of the Watergate burglars.
Answer: John Sirica
This man was recently revealed to have been the top-secret Watergate informant known as “Deep Throat.”
Answer: W. Mark Felt
5.Name these famous hijackers FTPE.
This man hijacked Northwest Orient Airlines flight 305 and then parachuted from the back of the plane with $200,000 in ransom money. He was never seen again.
Answer: Dan or D.B. Cooper
This man hijacked Delta Air Lines flight 523 in 1974, intending to fly it into the White House and kill President Nixon.
Answer: Samuel Byck
This disgruntled FedEx employee hijacked FedEx flight 705 in 1994 with the intention of flying it into FedEx headquarters in Memphis.
Answer: AuburnCalloway
6.FTPE, answer these questions about punk rock and heavy metal music.
In 1986, this man was sued after it was alleged that his song “Suicide Solution” had driven two boys to kill themselves.
Answer: Ozzy Osbourne
In a similar lawsuit in 1990, this band was alleged to have hidden the subliminal message “Do it” in their song “Better By You, Better Than Me” and was blamed for the attempted suicides of two boys.
Answer: Judas Priest
In “Next Stop, Nowhere,” a 1982 episode of this Jack Klugman detective show, punk music is blamed for causing the suicide of a young girl.
Answer: Quincy, M.E.
7.Name these Ernest Hemingway works given plot summaries.
Published posthumously in 1986, this novel involves a love triangle between a writer named David Bourne, his wife Catherine, and a woman named Maria.
Answer: The Garden of Eden
The basis for one of Andrei Tarkovsky’s student films, this story deals with two hit men who are pursuing a boxer known as “the Swede.”
Answer: The Killers
While on a big-game hunt with Robert Wilson, the title character of this story faces down a charging buffalo and is shot through the head by his wife.
Answer: The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber
8.FTPE, answer these questions about the Mercury 7.
This man was blamed, perhaps unfairly, for the loss of Liberty Bell 7 when it was claimed that he had blown the hatch too soon. He later died in the Apollo 1 fire.
Answer: Virgil “Gus” Grissom
This man, famously susceptible to colds, went into space on Mercury 8, Gemini 6A, and as the commander of Apollo 7.
Answer: Wally Schirra, Jr.
This man won 2 million dollars in the Jeopardy! Ultimate Tournament of Champions for realizing that Scott Carpenter and Gordon Cooper were the only two of the Mercury 7 whose last names were also occupations. (I guess “Alan Shepard” doesn’t count.)
Answer: Brad Rutter
9.FTPE, answer these questions about the Congo crisis of the 1960s.
In 1960, the Republic of the Congo declared independence from Belgium with Patrice Lumumba as its Prime Minister and this man as its President.
Answer: Joseph Kasavubu
From 1960 to 1963, this breakaway province in the southern Congo declared itself an independent state.
Answer: Katanga
This UN Secretary-General was killed in a plane crash while flying to mediate the Katangan secession conflict.
Answer: Dag Hammarskjöld
10.Her father, Jack, won three Olympic gold medals in rowing, and her brother won a bronze.
FTP, name this favorite actress of Alfred Hitchcock who won a 1954 Oscar for The Country Girl.
Answer: Grace Kelly or Princess Grace of Monaco