U.S. History trivia quiz

A lot of end-of-the-year cleanup
172. Julius Henry I can knock this one off the list. That would have been from LBJ’s death in January 1973 until Nixon’s resignation in August 1974. Correct

  1. I believe Lincoln, with the 1909 Lincoln “wheat sheaf” penny. Correct, OtakuLoki

  2. The second Cabinet Secretary to become President?
    Madison was the second Secretary of State to become president. Jefferson was first. by Petey

  3. What year was the first polio vaccine announced? It is not 1951.

  1. Moe Berg

  2. Al Smith?

  3. Black Maria

  4. Clement Vanlandingham (spelling of last name probably wrong)

  5. The area around Tuscon (Gadsen Purchase), for $10 million.

  6. Doughfaces

  7. Fire-Eaters

  8. The USS Oregon

  9. Dixon’s Notch?

  1. Dixon’s Notch?
    Very close
  1. Detroit White Mayor. Gribbs but many militant blacks claim it was Dennis Archer

Two from my Rte 66 category are still outstanding:
346. From Chicago to LA, Rte 66 goes through these states?

  1. This world famous bridge with a 22° bend it the middle was once a part of Rte 66?

Various & sundry of mine that I don’t see answered
248. This Attorney General served the longest term of office?

  1. This Watergate prosecutor was also a member of the 9/11 Commission?

  2. I am prepared to run over my own mother to get the President re-elected [Watergate Era] Not G Gordon Liddy, this guy may have been as tough as Liddy.

A potpourri of ethnic mobsters in American History
443. This getaway car driver testified at the Kefauver Commission hearing.

  1. Members of this gang were gunned down in the St Valentine’s Day Massacre.

  2. The most recently legally executed mobster in the United States? [Hint: he was not from the New York-New Jersey Territories]

Another numismatic question:

  1. There are two varieties of the 1909 Lincoln penny. What are they, and why was the change made? (Note: this is not a reference to mint marks.)

Doing this without looking up the details:

The coin was designed by Victor D. Brenner, who placed his initials on the coin, IIRC in an obvious place at the bottom of the reverse. For reasons I don’t recall this made some people think it was a socialist plot, and the initials became controversial, and were removed fairly early in the coinage run, so only a small percentage of the 1909 coins were issued with the initials. The San Francisco mint version with initials was extremely rare, the least common and most expensive coin variety that was not a minting error of all Lincoln cents. (Note: the initials were restored, this time inconspicuously at the base of the Lincoln bust, about ten years later.)

I’ll give you this, though I’d always heard that instead of a socialist plot, it was simply that the combination of the letters V and D was suggestive, as most ahem reasonable people knew that meant Venereal Disease.

Certainly the two versions I’d referenced were the “VDB” and the “non-VDB” coins. ISTR that the initials were moved to under the bust, where they are, still, that same year, but I can’t say for certain.

  1. When was the last time there were no living ex-Presidents?

During the Harding and Coolidge Administrations, from Woodrow Wilson’s death (I think in 1921 but it may have been '22 or '23) and March 3, 1929, when Coolidge left office.

  1. Before the Civil War, Northern politicians who were pro-Southern in their views and/or policies were called _____?

Mugwumps

  1. In the same time period, the Southerners who were most ardently pro-slavery and pro-secession were called _____?

Fire-eaters

  1. Who was the first Episcopal bishop in the U.S.? Hint: A seminary was later named after him.

Samuel Seabury – who was also the only one ordained by the Scottish Episcopal Church; the St. Andrew’s Cross in the Episcopal Church’s shield logo commemorates this.

  1. This one-armed Civil War veteran explored the Grand Canyon.

John Wesley Harding

  1. This tiny burg in New England is famous for voting first in national elections? (Incorrect guess: Hart’s Location, NH).

Dixville Notch, NH

  1. The second Cabinet Secretary to become President?

James Madison was Jefferson’s Secretary of State – Jefferson having been Washington’s.

Some “expired” questions I’ve left dangling.

*230. What was the name of the radioactive “health” drink that caused a scandal which provided some of the impetus to get the original legislation forming the FDA passed? *

Radiothor.

*399. One of the early reactors gave rise to an acronym that is used to this day to describe shutting down a nuclear fission reactor. What is this acronym, and what words were used to develop the acronym? *

The acronym is SCRAM. The phrase that corresponds to it is “Shutdown Control Rod Ax Man.” Given the people we’re talking about I don’t know whether the job was given a title that backed into the name, or not. This early pile had the control rods pulled out of the core by winch-like apparatus, with rope being wound onto drums. Instead of trying to improvise a way to let the drums spin freely, in case of a need to shut down the reactor quickly, they stationed men with axes at the rope, with instructions to use the axes to cut the ropes, if they heard the order, “SCRAM.” Presumably, after that, they were to run [del]screaming[/del] out of the building, too. :wink:

400. In the 1950’s the US Gov’t subsidized the construction of a small town in the vicinity of Los Alamos, at the request of the researchers there. What was the grim nickname for this town? And what was the maximum population of this town?

Doomtown. Population: Zero. It was a mock-up town with dummies planted through the school, houses, and ISTR even a small clinic/hospital. Then when everything was ready - they detonated a small nuclear bomb so they could measure the effects.

*466. Who said this after the Battle of Bunker Hill: “Another three such victories and we will have lost the colonies”?
*

General Thomas Gage, the man who was replaced by Lord Howe.

  1. St. Valentine’s Day massacre – Bugs Moran

I think I answered this before.

Taking some wild shots here:

  1. Polio vaccine - 1959
  2. End of cattle trail - Abilene
  3. Last year for the draft - 1972
  4. Portrayed FDR - Edward Hermann

All correct except 118. And 138’s name is spelled “Vallandigham.”

Both correct - very good!

Answer to 514: Jimmy Byrnes

NEW QUESTIONS: These three relate to identical namesakes:

516: Grandfather and grandson were respectively Vice President and two-time unsuccessful Presidential candidate.

517: General who was father of a President and whose namesake was a President.

518: Grandfather and grandson Supreme Court justices, both remembered principally for their dissents.

And:

519: He served in the cabinets of Taft, Hoover, FDR, and Truman.

516: Grandfather and grandson were respectively Vice President and two-time unsuccessful Presidential candidate.

Adlai Stevenson

Benjamin Harrison (signer of Declaration of Independence) was father of William Henry Harrison and great-grandfather of President Benjamin Harrison.

(not sure if he was a general)

  1. Correct as to Jimmy Byrnes, who joined the Cabinet of his good friend and former colleague Harry Truman, and during his career also served as governor of South Carolina and as a Supreme Court justice.

My answers:

  1. Both were named John Marshall Harlan, IIRC.

  2. Henry Stimson.

Speakers of the U.S. House of Representatives.

  1. This first Speaker of the U.S. House hailed from Pennsylvania.
  2. He ruled with an iron fist, gave his name to a House office building and demanded that the House restaurant always offer his beloved bean soup.
  3. LBJ was a protege of his, and was once photographed affectionately kissing the top of the Speaker’s bald head.
  4. He married the eldest daughter of Theodore Roosevelt.
  5. Speaker Dennis Hastert had this nickname, a relic of his earlier career.
  1. I’m going to go with Henry Clay, here.