# Trivia Dominoes: Play Off the Last Bit of Trivia **URL:** \ **Category:** Thread Games\ **Created:** [February 4, 2010, 8:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657 "2010-02-04T08:12:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1766
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2017, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35307 "2017-06-25T22:04:20Z")
Gaius Plinius Secundus, better known as Pliny the Elder, was a Roman author, naturalist, and natural philosopher, as well as naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and personal friend of the emperor Vespasian. He died while attempting the rescue by ship of a friend and his family in Stabiae from the eruption of Mount Vesuvius which had just destroyed the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum. The wind caused by the sixth and largest pyroclastic surge of the eruption would not allow his ship to leave the shore, and Pliny probably died during this event. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35308 "2017-06-26T01:05:05Z")
A pyroclastic flow is a fast-moving current of hot gas and volcanic matter which reaches speeds moving away from a volcano of up to 450 mph and reach temperatures of about 1,830 °F. The cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, Italy, for example, were engulfed by pyroclastic surges in August 24, 79 AD. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35309 "2017-06-26T14:54:54Z")
President John F. Kennedy suggested that his aides read Barbara Tuchman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning _The Guns of August_, about the leadup to World War I, to better understand how events can spin out of control during an international crisis. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35310 "2017-06-26T15:17:28Z")
_The Whales of August_ is a 1987 American drama film based on the play of the same name by David Berry and starring Bette Davis and Lillian Gish as elderly sisters. Also in the cast were Ann Sothern as one of their friends, and Vincent Price as a peripheral member of the former Russian aristocracy. The film was shot on location on Maine’s Cliff Island. The house still stands and is a popular subject of artists on the island. This was the final film directed by Lindsay Anderson and the final film roles by Lillian Gish and Ann Sothern. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35311 "2017-06-26T16:20:03Z")
Botanically, the eggplant is a berry, and so is the cucumber and banana. But strawberries and raspberries do not meet the criteria for berry-hood. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35312 "2017-06-26T16:44:07Z")
On “The Flip Wilson Show”, Wilson once told a story: > [@](#): > > This is a story about a Roman. His name was Herman. His name was Roman Herman. The fad of the era was berries. People collected berries. They were a status symbol. One day, while Roman Herman was roaming the outskirts of Rome, he spied a berry. It was the most beautiful berry he had ever seen. He took the berry and brought it to his wife, who loved berries. She saw the berry. She praised it. She said “That’s an awful nice berry you got there Herman!” Pretty soon, word got around about the berry. People came from all over Rome to see the berry, and to praise it. One night, there was a menacing knock on the door. It was late. Herman opened it. He said “Who are you?” They said “We’ve come for your berry.” He says “It’s not my berry, it’s my wife’s berry. Have you come to praise her berry?” They say, “No, we’ve come to seize her berry, not to praise it.” ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35313 "2017-06-26T17:17:02Z")
Wilson Square is the chief square of northern Warsaw’s Żoliborz district. It is also one of the Polish capital’s main transport hubs, with several bus and streetcars stops. Named for U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, after World War II it was renamed Paris Commune Square. In 1991 the original name was restored. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35314 "2017-06-26T17:25:03Z")
Boston Massachusetts’s nickname of “The Hub” is a shortened form of a phrase recorded by writer Oliver Wendell Holmes, who called it The Hub of the Solar System.This has since developed into The Hub of the Universe ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35315 "2017-06-26T19:22:31Z")
Boxing champion Larry Holmes won his first 48 professional bouts, 1 short of Rocky Marciano’s heavyweight record, before losing to Michael Spinks, and again in the rematch. He was unsuccessful in three further attempts (against Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield and Oliver McCall) to regain the heavyweight title. ---
**Author:** ![gkster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gkster/32/14107_2.png) [@gkster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gkster)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35316 "2017-06-26T22:18:36Z")
The name Evander comes from classical antiquity; its Greek meaning, Evandros, means strong man. In Virgil’s _Aeneid_ Evander is King of Pallanteum, a region of Arcadia, in Italy. He is a sworn enemy of the Latins, and Aeneas befriends him and secures his assistance in the battles against Turnus, ruler of the Rutulians and suitor of Lavinia, daughter of Latinus, King of the Latins. ---
**Author:** ![ozziemaland](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/f07891/32.png) [@ozziemaland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ozziemaland)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35317 "2017-06-26T22:32:33Z")
Poet John Homes’ widow, Doris Homes Eyges, has a biography of her husband online which includes this paragraph: > [@](#): > > For eight years Holmes served as poetry editor of the Boston Evening Transcript. A particular chum there was Howard Mumford Jones, Harvard English professor specializing in American Literature. During a spell when Holmes had a scarcity of books of verse to review, he and Jones decided to make up a poet. They took the middle names of two secretaries and concocted Preston Gurney. Holmes would refer to him in a column, or compare the fictional Gurney with some actual versifier being reviewed. One day Holmes was in Goodspeed’s book shop under the Old South Church. A clerk took a book down off the shelf and handed it to him saying, “You write so much about this poet I figured I should set this aside for you.” Holmes thought Jones was going to an awful lot of trouble to play this joke on him. But, no, it was a slim volume published about 1900 by Preston Gurney. See: // _[https://web.archive.org/web/20070807090011/http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/unitarians/jtholmes.html](https://web.archive.org/web/20070807090011/http://www.harvardsquarelibrary.org/unitarians/jtholmes.html)_ ETA: The name Evander is less common than the name Holmes. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2017, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35318 "2017-06-26T23:22:01Z")
The instrumentalists in the British folk rock group Mumford & Sons - Ben Lovett, Winston Marshall, and Ted Dwane - are not the sons of lead singer Marcus Mumford. The name was selected to present the image of an antiquated family business. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35319 "2017-06-27T01:41:16Z")
Marcus Aurelius was the last of the so-called “Five Good Emperors”, namely Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antonius Pius, and Marcus Aurelius. They presided over the Roman Empire at its height, which Gibbon identified as the best period in human existence. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35320 "2017-06-27T02:02:26Z")
Richard Harris played Emperor Marcus Aurelius in the 2000 Roman epic _Gladiator_. He is shown murdered by his son Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix), who succeeded him as Emperor. There is no historical evidence that Commodus actually murdered his father (as may be said of many other things in that movie). ---
**Author:** ![ozziemaland](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/f07891/32.png) [@ozziemaland](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ozziemaland)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35321 "2017-06-27T02:40:50Z")
The movie _Gladiator_ does have some aspects that are supported by this Wiki quote: > [@](#): > > After repeated attempts on Commodus’ life, Roman citizens were often killed for making him angry. One such notable event was the attempted extermination of the house of the Quinctilii. Condianus and Maximus were executed on the pretext that, while they were not implicated in any plots, their wealth and talent would make them unhappy with the current state of affairs. ---
**Author:** ![gkster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gkster/32/14107_2.png) [@gkster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gkster)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35322 "2017-06-27T02:45:47Z")
The _Meditations_ of Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius were not written for publication; they consist of his journals where he recorded his philosophical reflections. Containing lines such as “The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts” and “You have power over your mind; not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength”, the _Meditations_ has been called the first self-help book. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35323 "2017-06-27T02:57:53Z")
The \*Meditations \*of Marcus Aurelius were first published in 1558 by Wilhelm Xylander at Heidelberg University. Bill Clinton says the book (in English, I would assume) is his favorite book. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35324 "2017-06-27T13:22:29Z")
E. Gordon Gee served as president of Ohio State University twice. His second tenure was cut short when he made, over the span of several years, what were widely seen as insensitive and insulting jokes about Polish people, Catholics and football rivals of OSU. Gee, who has served as president of more American universities than any other person, is now president of West Virginia University. > **[E. Gordon Gee](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._Gordon_Gee)** > > Elwood Gordon Gee (born February 2, 1944), known as E. Gordon Gee, is an American academic. As of 2020, he was serving his second term as President of West Virginia University; his first term was from 1981 to 1985. Gee has held more university presidencies than any other American. He was head of University of Colorado Boulder from 1985 to 1990, of Ohio State University from 1990 to 1997, of Brown University from 1998 to 2000, of Vanderbilt University from 2000 to 2007, and of Ohio State Gee st... ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35325 "2017-06-27T13:26:02Z")
Author Don Robertson is best known for his trio of novels featuring Morris Bird III: The Greatest Thing Since Sliced Bread, The Sum and Total of Now, and The Greatest Thing That Almost Happened, all set in the fictional town of Paradise Falls, Ohio… A movie adaptation of The Greatest Thing That Almost Happened aired on NBC in 1977, starring Jimmie Walker and James Earl Jones. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2017, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/35326 "2017-06-27T14:41:46Z")
James Earl Jones’ first film role was as one of Slim Pickens’ B-52 crewmen in _Doctor Strangelove_. His breakout role was as the black boxing champion, based on Jack Johnson, in _The Great White Hope._ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=1765) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=1767)