# 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:** 954
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19064 "2014-03-04T02:31:20Z")
The province of Québec is immediately east of Ontario. A handy acronym to remember the main provinces is BASMOQ. The “Eye of Québec” is an interesting feature viewable from space - one of Earth’s oldest known meteorite impact craters, or astroblemes. The ring of the lake was formed by the impact, and the island in the middle was formed by the post-impact uplift of the land. — Article, including space shuttle picture: [http://www.newscientist.com/gallery/spectacular-earth-impact-craters](http://www.newscientist.com/gallery/spectacular-earth-impact-craters) — Google maps link: [Google Maps](https://goo.gl/maps/BgdI6) — Wikipedia, Manicouagan Reservoir: [Manicouagan Reservoir - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manicouagan_Reservoir) Ninja’d by Rick. Still in play: “River Thames” is another such example. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19065 "2014-03-04T02:56:12Z")
The River Thames stretches for 215 miles (346 km). It is the longest river entirely in England, and the second longest river in the UK (the River Severn is the longest). The Thames, from Middle English _Temese_, is derived from the Celtic name for the river, _Tamesas_, which likely means “dark”. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19066 "2014-03-04T05:25:09Z")
“The Thames is no ordinary waterway, it is the golden thread of our nation’s history,” said British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. ETA: Thanks for the info on Nissenthall, **Northern Piper**. Hadn’t heard of that before. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19067 "2014-03-04T06:43:44Z")
In his lifetime, Winston Churchill painted several hundred paintings. In Paris in 1920, he exhibited his paintings under the name Charles Moren. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19068 "2014-03-04T14:45:11Z")
Karsh’s famous portrait photo of Churchill was taken at the Chateau Laurier in Ottawa during a war-time visit. Karsh was not happy with his first few takes, and then suddenly took Churchill’s cigar away from him and took the picture, showing a glowering, indomitable Churchill. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19069 "2014-03-04T16:12:50Z")
Winston Churchill painted just a single picture during the six years of World War II, a landscape of the Atlas Mountains near Marrakesh. (I learned that from Roy Jenkins’s excellent bio _Churchill_). ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19070 "2014-03-04T16:33:10Z")
Due to the flatness of the Dutch countryside, most of the Dutch masters took to painting very dramatic clouds in their landscape paintings to give them visual appeal. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2014, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19071 "2014-03-04T16:41:37Z")
The packaging for Dutch Masters brand cigars features Rembrandt’s 1662 painting \*The Syndics of the Drapers’ Guild (De Staalmeesters). \* They sponsored Ernie Kovacs’ comedy show on early TV. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19072 "2014-03-04T17:50:47Z")
Rembrandt’s _The Storm on the Sea of Galilee_, from 1633, is still missing after the robbery from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston in 1990. Image link for painting: [![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Rembrandt_Christ_in_the_Storm_on_the_Lake_of_Galilee.jpg) ](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f3/Rembrandt_Christ_in_the_Storm_on_the_Lake_of_Galilee.jpg) ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19073 "2014-03-04T18:22:53Z")
The two still-unidentified thieves who robbed the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum gained entrance by pretending to be officers of the Boston Police Department. The spaces from which the stolen paintings were taken remain empty, as Gardner’s bequest specified that none of the collection could ever be rearranged. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19074 "2014-03-04T18:38:17Z")
The BPD, Boston Police Dep’t, was established in 1838 but according to Wikipedia did not have its first commissioner until 65 years later when, in 1903, William H. H. Emmons became the first. The third commissioner, Edwin Upton Curtis, was the first commissioner to also have held the office of Mayor of Boston. Curtis was the Boston Mayor in 1895 before being the BPD Commissioner from 1918 to 1922. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19075 "2014-03-04T18:52:15Z")
While a practicing Ohio lawyer, William Howard Taft once was at a rural whistlestop and sent a telegraph down the line asking for the next train to “stop for a large party.” When it stopped and the conductor asked where everyone was, Taft stepped aboard and said, “I am the large party.” ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19076 "2014-03-04T20:34:20Z")
Taft, CA is a city about 30 miles west-southwest of Bakersfield. Taft’s former city/town names include, in turn, Siding Number Two, Moro, and then Moron. (Yes, **Moron** ) Taft was originally Siding Number Two on the Sunset Railroad. In the early 1900s its residents wanted the name changed to Moro, but confusion with Morro Bay, CA led the name to be changed to Moron. At that time, the word moron had no association to mental retardation. After a fire burned much of the town, the name was changed to Taft in honor of William Howard Taft. ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2014, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19077 "2014-03-04T21:19:01Z")
The 1964 Jan & Dean song “Dead Man’s Curve” refers to a dangerous section of Sunset Boulevard in West L.A. which had claimed at least three lives and caused over 25 accidents, including the near-fatal crash of famous voice actor Mel Blanc. William “Jan” Berry himself was nearly killed in an auto accident two years later; however, contrary to popular belief, Jan’s crash took place on a side street near Sunset, not on Dead Man’s Curve itself. (The actual “curve” was reconstructed in 1961 to become less dangerous.) ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19078 "2014-03-04T21:39:35Z")
Wikipedia has a [listing of Dead Man’s Curves in the United States](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Man's_Curve) that has locations in 18 states. The only one for Hawaii is on Oahu, at the end of Kapaa Quarry Road in Kailua. It has claimed at least 8 lives and is considered one of Oahu’s haunted roads. ---
**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:** [March 4, 2014, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19079 "2014-03-04T23:20:38Z")
The first settlers of Hawaii arrived sometime between 300 and 500 CE, having traveled from the Marquesas. ---
**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:** [March 5, 2014, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19080 "2014-03-05T02:17:51Z")
The state flag of Hawaii is the only one to include the flag of another country, the Union Flag of Great Britain, in its canton. It was adopted as the flag of Hawaii in December 1845, more than a century before statehood. > **[Flag of Hawaii](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_hawaii)** > > The official flag of Hawaii (Hawaiian: Ka Hae Hawaiʻi) was first adopted in the early 19th century by the Hawaiian Kingdom and continued to be used after its overthrow in 1893. It is the only U.S. state flag to feature a foreign country's national flag—that of the United Kingdom's Union Jack—which commemorates the Royal Navy's historical relations with the Kingdom of Hawaii, and in particular the pro-British sentiment of its founder and first ruler, King Kamehameha I. > The Hawaiian flag is a... ---
**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:** [March 5, 2014, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19081 "2014-03-05T02:18:04Z")
NM, ninja’d by EH. ---
**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:** [March 5, 2014, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19082 "2014-03-05T02:35:18Z")
The Union Jack flew unofficially as the flag of Hawaii from 1793 to 1816 ---
**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:** [March 5, 2014, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657/19083 "2014-03-05T06:43:47Z")
The Union Jack is made up of the Cross of Saint Andrew (a white saltire on a blue background), the Cross of Saint Patrick (a red saltire on a white background) and the Cross of Saint George (a red cross on a white background). The design dates from a royal proclamation of 1801, merging the flags of Scotland, Ireland and England. The flag of Wales (a red dragon on a white and green background) is not included, nor is the Flag of Saint David (a yellow cross on a black background). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=953) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/trivia-dominoes-play-off-the-last-bit-of-trivia/527657.md?page=955)