Ken Jennings's Trivia Almanac Read Free Page A

XVI Gustaf misspelled his own name on the accession document that gave him the throne?
    9. What Washington Wizards All-Star still bears the misplaced
w
in his name from a birth certificate typo?
    10. According to his best seller, what word inspired Chris Gardner when he saw it misspelled in a Bay Area day care center in 1981?

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    1896 F RANCE’S PIONEERING MOVIEMAKING TEAM, the Lumière brothers, show their fifty-second silent film
Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat
to a Paris audience for the first time. According to legend, those in the audience panic and jump from their seats when they see the image of an enormous train barreling toward the camera.
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    SCREEN DEBUTS
    Can you match up these film firsts?
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1.
Pippa Passes
(1909)
    2.
Inspiration
(1915)
    3.
Wings
(1927)
    4.
Lights of New York
(1928)
    5.
It Happened One Night
(1934)
    6.
Becky Sharp
(1935)
    7.
Topper
(1937)
    8.
Bringing Up Baby
(1938)
    9.
Bwana Devil
(1952)
    10.
The Robe
(1953)

A. First use of Steadicam
    B. First scheduled in-flight movie
    C. First American film nudity
    D. First all-sound film
    E. First studio film with a black director
    F. First film in CinemaScope
    G. First “director’s cut”
    H. First three-strip Technicolor
    I. First film shown on HBO
    J. First use of the infamous “f-word”
11.
By Love Possessed
(1961)
    12.
Ulysses
(1967)
    13.
The Learning Tree
(1969)
    14.
A Clockwork Orange
(1971)
    15.
Sometimes a Great Notion
(1971)
    16.
Westworld
(1973)
    17.
Bound for Glory
(1976)
    18.
Heaven’s Gate
(1980)
    19.
Red Dawn
(1984)
    20.
Lost in Yonkers
(1993)

K. First Best Picture Oscar
    L. First film edited digitally, via Avid
    M. First
New York Times
movie review
    N. First computer graphics
    O. First film with Dolby sound
    P. First PG-13-rated film
    Q. First film of the 3-D boom
    R. First use of “gay” as slang term
    S. First film to sweep the five major Oscars
    T. First classic film to be “colorized”
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JANUARY 7
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    1797 T HE SHORT-LIVED Cispadane Republic makes the red, white, and green
Tricolore
its official flag. Today, it’s the national flag of Italy. If not for the brave Cispadanes, who knows what Olive Garden restaurants would look like today?
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    THE ITALIAN JOB
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    1. What style of pants is named for an island in the Gulf of Naples?
    2. What craftsman used willow, spruce, and maple woods to make the “Christian Hammer,” which sold at auction for a record $3.5 million in 2006?
    3. What Sergio Leone “spaghetti western” is a remake of Kurosawa’s
Yojimbo
?
    4. Who was the first Italian American to serve on the Supreme Court?
    5. For what famous son is Genoa’s airport named?

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    1927 T HE H ARLEM G LOBETROTTERS play their very first game, taking on the Hinckley (Illinois) Merchants. As some Hinckley fans remember it, the Globetrotters (then the Giles Post American Legion) actually lost that first game, 43–34.
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    UNDERDOG DAYS
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    1. What 42-to-1 underdog KO’d Mike Tyson in Tokyo in 1990?
    2. Who started the Colts’ Super Bowl III loss to the Jets, while Johnny Unitas sat on the sidelines?
    3. Whom did unknown golfer Jack Fleck beat in an 18-hole playoff to win the 1955 U.S. Open?
    4. What nation did the U.S. hockey team beat in the finals of its improbable gold medal run at Lake Placid?
    5. What was the first expansion team to win a World Series?
    6. What was the appropriate name of the only horse ever to beat Man o’ War?
    7. In 1982, what tiny Hawaii Division II school somehow beat Ralph Sampson’s number one Virginia Cavaliers?
    8. What nation defeated mighty Brazil in the “Maracanazo” to win the 1950 World Cup?
    9. What coach famously ran up and down the sidelines in disbelief after his team edged Houston in the 1983 NCAA Finals?
    10. Who lost a toe to frostbite in 2002, two years after stealing a gold medal from undefeated Russian wrestler Alexander Karelin?

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    1955 S PENCER T RACY’S CLASSIC FILM
Bad Day at Black Rock
premieres. It’s the first MGM movie to