# 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:** 2015
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40289 "2018-09-24T18:04:26Z")
The Red River of the South forms the boundary between two states on US Route 66, Oklahoma and Texas. It also forms a short part of the boundary between Texas and Arkansas, before it turns into Arkansas and then Louisiana, where it ends. This river begins in the Texas panhandle, and ends in Louisiana where it drains into the Atchafalaya River. ---
**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:** [September 24, 2018, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40290 "2018-09-24T18:34:15Z")
The northernmost area of the U.S. state of Texas is called the Panhandle. It is straight and narrow like the handle of a pan with the broader area of the state below it, like the bottom of a pan. This region has mostly flat, grassy land or plains. These plains are part of the same flat grassland that extends from the Great Plains of the Central United States. The land is mostly treeless and is on a high, flat plateau. ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40291 "2018-09-24T18:39:42Z")
States with areas that are typically considered panhandles include, in alphabetical order, Alaska, Florida, Idaho, Oklahoma, and Texas. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40292 "2018-09-24T19:39:08Z")
The Alaska panhandle (known to Alaskans simply as “Southeast Alaska”) is home to the present capital of Juneau (named after Joe Juneau, a gold miner from Quebec), and the older capital of Sitka, which is actually an island. Prior to being renamed Juneau, the site was known as Rockwell and Harrisburg (named after Juneau’s mining partner, Richard Harris). ---
**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:** [September 24, 2018, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40293 "2018-09-24T20:38:56Z")
In addition to Alaska, Florida, Idaho, Oklahoma, and Texas, with their paltry one each, West Virginia has \*two \*panhandles: [West Virginia Panhandle - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Virginia_Panhandle) ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40294 "2018-09-24T21:08:44Z")
In geography, panhandles are called salients, which are geopolitical protrusions delimited by a land border on at least two sides and extending out from the larger geographical body of the main administrative unit. ---
**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:** [September 24, 2018, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40295 "2018-09-24T21:14:59Z")
The best-known double stars in the night sky are Mizar and Alcor, which are easy to find in the handle of the Big Dipper (or the panhandle, if the Dipper is pictured as a saucepan). Mizar is really four stars, and Alcor is really two stars. So what we see as one star, or two stars if we have good eyesight, are really six in one. ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40296 "2018-09-24T21:38:44Z")
The Messier 45 star cluster in the constellation Taurus is one of the most obvious star clusters to the naked eye. There are ten stars ranging in apparent magnitude from 2.86 to 5.66, where apparent magnitude is an inverse logarithmic brightness measure. The sun, at apparent magnitude -26.7, is the brightest object in our sky, and the full moon has an apparent magnitude of -12.7. Messier 45 is more commonly known as the Pleiades, or the Seven Sisters. The nine brightest stars are named for the Seven Sisters of Greek mythology, and their parents: Sterope, Merope, Electra, Maia, Taygeta, Celaeno, and Alcyone, and Atlas and Pleione. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40297 "2018-09-24T22:00:20Z")
The name of the Pleiades comes from Ancient Greek. It probably derives from plein (“to sail”) because of the cluster’s importance in delimiting the sailing season in the Mediterranean Sea: “the season of navigation began with their heliacal rising”. However, in mythology the name was used for the Pleiades, seven divine sisters, the name supposedly deriving from that of their mother Pleione and effectively meaning “daughters of Pleione”. In reality, the name of the star cluster almost certainly came first, and Pleione was invented to explain it. ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2018, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40298 "2018-09-24T23:25:03Z")
Subaru is the Japanese name for Pleiades, and the Subaru logo shows the star cluster. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2018, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40299 "2018-09-25T01:07:08Z")
The first Subaru car, which began manufacturing in 1954, was named the Subaru 1500. Only twenty were manufactured owing to multiple supply issues. ---
**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:** [September 25, 2018, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40300 "2018-09-25T04:42:48Z")
Among the critics of “supply side economics”, the theory that economic growth can be most effectively created by lowering taxes and decreasing regulation, are John Kenneth Galbraith and Paul Krugman. Galbraith called supply-side economics “merely a cover for the trickle-down approach to economic policy—what an older and less elegant generation called the horse-and-sparrow theory: If you feed the horse enough oats, some will pass through to the road for the sparrows.” Krugman called it “a set of foolish ideas” and “a crank doctrine that would have had little influence if it did not appeal to the prejudices of editors and wealthy men.” ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2018, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40301 "2018-09-25T07:30:40Z")
In 1963 President John F. Kennedy advocated a drastic tax-rate cut when the top income tax rate was 91%, arguing that tax “rates are too high today and tax revenues too low, and the soundest way to raise revenues in the long run is to cut rates now". The Revenue Act of 1964 emerged from Congress and was signed by Kennedy’s successor Lyndon Johnson on February 26, 1964. The stated goals of the tax cuts were to raise personal incomes, increase consumption and increase capital investment. ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2018, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40302 "2018-09-25T14:24:53Z")
John F. Kennedy began his political career in 1946 when he ran for Congress in the 11th congressional district of Massachusetts. With his father financing and running his campaign, Kennedy won the Democratic primary with 12 percent of the vote, defeating ten other candidates. In the general election, Kennedy defeated his Republican opponent, taking 73 percent of the vote. Along with Richard Nixon and Joseph McCarthy, Kennedy was one of several World War II veterans first elected to Congress that year. ---
**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:** [September 25, 2018, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40303 "2018-09-25T14:36:22Z")
John F. Kennedy, as a very young-looking freshman member of the U.S. House of Representatives, was once told by a Capitol Police officer, “Those phones are only for Congressmen, son.” [![](https://www.irishcentral.com/uploads/article/119639/cropped_JFK-100-jfk-young-main-Presidents-Collection.-John-F.-Kennedy-Presidential-Library-and-Museum..jpg) ](https://www.irishcentral.com/uploads/article/119639/cropped_JFK-100-jfk-young-main-Presidents-Collection.-John-F.-Kennedy-Presidential-Library-and-Museum..jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2018, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40304 "2018-09-25T15:14:21Z")
Kennedy, California, some 80 miles east of San Francisco (gMap [Google Maps](https://goo.gl/p1Jh88)), is a small town about 1 square mile in size and whose population is about 3,000 people. Kennedy, California is about 2,200 miles from Kennedy, Alabama, a small town about 3 square miles in size and whose population is about 400 people (gMap [https://goo.gl/PmqaHy](https://goo.gl/PmqaHy)). ---
**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:** [September 25, 2018, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40305 "2018-09-25T15:29:39Z")
On the Doors’s cover of by Bertolt Brecht and Elisabeth Hauptmann’s Alabama Song (Whisky Bar)", the melody is changed and the verse beginning “Show me the way to the next little dollar…” is omitted. On the album version, Jim Morrison altered the second verse from “Show us the way to the next pretty boy” to “Show me the way to the next little girl” but, on the 1967 Live at the Matrix recording, he sings the original “… next pretty boy”. ---
**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:** [September 25, 2018, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40306 "2018-09-25T16:37:59Z")
On April 20th, **1967** , Surveyor 3 landed on the Moon. As Surveyor 3 was landing highly reflective rocks confused the spacecraft’s lunar descent radar. The engines failed to cut off at 14 feet in altitude as called for and this delay caused the lander to bounce on the lunar surface twice. Its first bounce reached the altitude of about 35 feet, while the second bounce reached a height of about 11 feet. Despite this, it transmitted 6,315 images to Earth. \*April 20th was also my 14th Birthday ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2018, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40307 "2018-09-25T16:39:14Z")
Lynyrd Skynyrd‘s second album, _Second Helping_ in 1974, contained one of their best known songs, _Sweet Home Alabama_. It reached number 8 on the US charts (and pretty high on **Earth** , I suppose) and was the band’s second hit single. The song was their reply to Neil Young‘s songs, _Southern Man_ (1970) and _Alabama_ (1972). None of the three writers of the song were from Alabama; Ronnie Van Zant and Gary Rossington were both born in Jacksonville FL, and Ed King was from Glendale CA. ---
**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:** [September 25, 2018, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/40308 "2018-09-25T16:43:05Z")
Rumor has it that April 20th become weed day because of the Dylan song “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35” and its lyric, “Everybody must get stoned,” and the fact when multiplying 12 by 35 equals 420. Dylan himself has never confirmed any link, and it does seem a bit of a stretch. In Robert Shelton’s biography of Dylan, Shelton said he was told by Phil Spector that the inspiration for the song came when Spector and Dylan heard the Ray Charles song, “Let’s Go Get Stoned” on a jukebox in Los Angeles, California. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=2014) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=2016)