# 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:** 2148
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42949 "2019-04-30T03:47:06Z")
President Abraham Lincoln’s two closest aides in the White House were John Nicolay and John Hay, who both later became diplomats and co-wrote the first major biography of him. Hay went on to serve as Secretary of State to William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42950 "2019-04-30T03:53:39Z")
Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, is named after the Queen’s deceased cousin, William of Gloucester. Although he was technically Prince Charles’s cousin once removed, he was much closer in age to Charles than to the Queen, and served almost as Charles’s big brother. William of Gloucester was a pilot. He died in a major crash at an air show in 1972, along with his copilot. Ten years later, Charles named his first-born after his deceased cousin. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42951 "2019-04-30T04:29:18Z")
Beatrix Potter’s best-known story is probably _The Tale of Peter Rabbit_, but her favorite among her books was _The Tailor of Gloucester_. The story is about a tailor whose work on an elaborately embroidered waistcoat for the Mayor’s wedding is finished by the grateful mice whom he rescues from his cat, and was based on a real-life incident involving a tailor and his assistants. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42952 "2019-04-30T04:57:56Z")
During the 1970s, guitarist / singer **Peter** Frampton’s signature instrument was a black-and-gold Les Paul, which he had received in 1970 from a fan. In 1980, a cargo plane carrying Frampton’s gear, for a South American tour, crashed upon takeoff in Venezuela, and the guitar was assumed lost. Decades later, the guitar was discovered by a guitar collector, in the hands of a local musician on the island of Curacao (it had apparently been salvaged from the plane wreckage). The guitar, now dubbed “the Phoenix,” was returned to Frampton in 2011, and guitarmaker Gibson restored it, though the scorched finish on the body was retained, as Frampton wanted it to keep its “battle scars.” [A recent picture of Frampton, and the Phoenix.](https://www.seymourduncan.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/Frampton-2.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:** [April 30, 2019, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42953 "2019-04-30T05:37:20Z")
On the day after Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crashed at San Francisco International Airport on a Saturday in July 2013, killing two people and injuring 180 others, all nine passengers and a pilot died in remote Soldotna, Alaska, when their air taxi crashed after takeoff. Today Natron Air, Talon Air Service, Andrew Airways, and Kenai Aviation are among the companies operating air taxis out of Soldotna. Talkeetna Air Taxi, established in 1947, currently operates a Cessna 185 Skywagon, 2 de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beavers, and 5 de Havilland Canada DHC-3 Otters out of Talkeetna, about 250 miles to the north. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42954 "2019-04-30T06:04:03Z")
The Asiana Air crash occurred on July 6, 2013. That same day, at about 1:15 am EDT, a train loaded with various petro-chemicals went runaway and crashed into the town of Lac Megantic in Quebec. The derailment caused a major explosion and fire. Forty-two deaths were confirmed, and another five people were missing and presumed dead. Their bodies have never been found, and were likely completely destroyed in the explosion and fire. There was a one km blast radius, and most of the town centre was destroyed. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42955 "2019-04-30T06:25:03Z")
On March 26, 1967 Jim Thompson went for a short walk down a road in the Cameron Highlands, Malaysia. His body has never been found. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42956 "2019-04-30T08:56:34Z")
Jimmy Hoffa disappeared from the parking lot of the Machus Red Fox restaurant in Bloomfield Township, a suburb of Detroit MI on Wednesday, July 30, 1975. Several eyewitnesses saw Hoffa standing by his car and pacing the restaurant’s parking lot. Two men saw Hoffa emerge from the Machus Red Fox after a long lunch and recognized him; they stopped to chat with him briefly and to shake his hand. Hoffa was never seen again, and his body has never been found. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42957 "2019-04-30T15:27:00Z")
_Bloom County_ is a comic strip that originally ran in national syndication from 1980 through 1989. The author is Berkeley Breathed, who first drew a comic strip known as _The Academia Waltz_, which Breathed produced for The Daily Texan, the student newspaper of the University of Texas. Breathed was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in editorial cartooning in 1987 for _Bloom County_. In 2015, Breathed started drawing the comic strip again; it can be seen on Facebook. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42958 "2019-04-30T16:06:57Z")
U.C. Berkeley has had many famous professors, including Ernest O. Lawrence, Glen Seaborg, Lotfi Zadeh, Edward Tolman and Ted Kaczynski. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42959 "2019-04-30T16:13:11Z")
The transuranium elements, with atomic numbers greater than 92, are all unstable and decay radioactively into other elements. They include berkelium, californium, and lawrencium, all named for the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, where they were discovered, and seaborgium, named after one of the discoverers there. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42960 "2019-04-30T17:05:00Z")
Thomas Edward Lawrence (Of Arabia) was an avid motorcyclist who was fatally injured in an accident on his Brough Superior SS100 motorcycle at age 46, just two months after leaving military service. A dip in the road obstructed his view of two boys on their bicycles; he swerved to avoid them, lost control, and was thrown over the handlebars. He died six days later on May 19, 1935.The location is marked by a small memorial at the side of the road. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42961 "2019-04-30T17:19:59Z")
In addition to T.E. Lawrence, Gertrude Bell played key roles in the desert campaigns of World War I and in the creation of the Hashemite Kingdoms. She was less well known than Lawrence, but her story is now told in a film starring Nicole Kidman. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42962 "2019-04-30T17:46:01Z")
In his standup comedy, Red Skelton told jokes about a pair of seagulls named Gertrude and Heathcliff. [All of them clean and wholesome, of course.](https://bestcleanfunnyjokes.com/gertrude-heathcliff-jokes/) ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42963 "2019-04-30T17:51:36Z")
Gertrude Lawrence was a major star of the London theater in the 1920s and 30s, often teaming up with Noel Coward. She later had success on Broadway, most notably as the original Anna in _The King and I_ ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42964 "2019-04-30T18:08:40Z")
Louis V ‘le Fainâeant’ was the last Carolingian King of France. He was a frivolous man who died very young, hence his nickname, which is sometimes (badly) rendered in English as `the Coward.’ ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42965 "2019-04-30T18:27:10Z")
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, country singer Kenny Rogers scored a number of crossover hits on the U.S. pop charts. Rogers had nine songs reach the pop Top 10, including “Lucille,” “Lady,” “Islands in the Stream” (a duet with Dolly Parton), and “Coward of the County.” ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42966 "2019-04-30T18:38:19Z")
Before his solo career, Kenny Rogers was a member of the synthetic-pap-folk (but popular) group The New Christy Minstrels, who were named after the 19th century blackface troupe [Christy’s Minstrels](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christy%27s_Minstrels). > [@](#): > > Christy’s novel three-part shows began with a “walkaround”, the company marching onto the stage singing and dancing. A staple of the walkaround was the cakewalk, which white audiences loved despite not realizing that it originated with plantation slaves imitating their masters’ walks. The troupe was then seated in a semicircle, with one member on each end playing the tambourine or the bones. The endmen were named Brother Tambo and Brother Bones, and they engaged in an exchange of jokes between the group’s songs and dances. It was customary for Tambo to be slim and Bones to be fat. A character called Mr. Interlocutor sat in the middle of the group, acting as the master of ceremonies. ---
**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:** [April 30, 2019, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42967 "2019-04-30T19:40:44Z")
Former heavyweight boxer Ken Norton, born in 1943, boxed professionally in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. In his first fight against Muhammad Ali in 1973, he broke Ali’s jaw and won in a split decision to become champion. For Ali, who was born in 1942, it was his second professional loss after 1971’s “The Fight of the Century” against Joe Frazier. Norton credits the book _Think and Grow Rich_, by Napoleon Hill, with providing inspiration for not just the win but also for 13 more straight victories, and also for changing his life. Just before he died in 2013, Norton said, “Think and Grow Rich changed my life dramatically. I was going to fight Muhammad Ali. I was a green fighter, but yet I won, all through reading this book." Norton first started boxing somewhat late in life, at the age of 20 (Ali was 12) in the US Marine Corps, where from 1963 to 1967 he compiled a 24–2 record en route to three All-Marine Heavyweight titles. In time, he became the best boxer to ever fight for the Marines. Semper Fidelis, Ken Norton. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2019, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/42968 "2019-04-30T21:09:03Z")
William `Buffalo Bill’ Cody, who may be a distant cousin of Ernest Hemingway due to their common 17th-century ancestor Richard Norton, was awarded the Medal of Honor for his service as an Army scout. The Medal was revoked shortly after Cody’s death at age 70, along with Medals awarded to other Army scouts — they were neither enlisted nor commissioned and hence ineligible. Eventually, at the request of Senator Alan K. Simpson of Wyoming. Army records were amended to show Cody as an enlisted soldier, and his Medal was restored. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=2147) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=2149)