Guildmade Maidens Trivia Quiz

Answer: The John Birch Society

Helen Keller joined the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1912, was a founding member of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in 1920, and campaigned for Socialist candidate Eugene Debs in each of his runs for the US Presidency. In contrast to these leftist organizations, the John Birch Society is a conservative, nationalist American group that opposes most of the social action programs and legislation that Keller worked for.

Though her own blindness and deafness was caused by a childhood illness, Keller recognized that the majority of blind men lost their sight in work-related accidents, while the majority of blind women lost their sight to syphilis, usually contracted through prostitution. Though many editorialists denounced her leftist views as "naive", Keller responded that though she could not see the conditions she regularly protested, she could smell them.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by Stuthehistoryguy

Answer: Doctor

In 1363 at age 16 Catherine Benincasa (now recognized as St. Catherine of Siena) became a "secular" Tertiary member of the religious order of Dominicans. From the outset it was clear that Catherine intended to be a reformer of ecclesiastical discipline, though distinctions between "ecclesiastical reforms" and "political allegiances" in the 14th century were blurred at best. As a "secular" Tertiary not constrained by living in community with other members, Catherine was free to advance her agenda as she saw fit - or as politics dictated.

Catherine's primary political focus was the return of the papacy to Rome from its French domination in Avignon since 1309. She represented the city-state of Florence in a political dispute with Pope Gregory XI at Avignon in 1376. Rising political tensions throughout the Papal States forced Gregory XI to coincidentally return to Rome the following year. When the cardinals elected the Italian Urban VI to succeed Gregory XI upon his death in 1378, Urban summoned Catherine to Rome from Florence to serve as an apologist for his ascendancy. She died in Rome in 1380 at age 33, unsuccessful in her advocacy of the claims of Urban VI over those of Clement VII who had also been elected Pope in 1378 by a rival French faction and who returned the papacy to Avignon.

It is for the populist and mystical theology ascribed to her in the text "Dialogue with Divine Providence" that Pope Paul VI gave her the title "Doctor of the Church" in 1970.

In the long history of the Roman Catholic Church only 33 members, male and female, have been so titled. The title is given to a proclaimed saint whose writings benefit the entire church for all ages and is granted only by a pope or a world council of all Catholic bishops.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by socalmiguel

Answer: Jennie Hodgers

Jennie Hodgers was born in Clogherhead, Co Louth, Ireland, on December 25 1844. She stowed away on a ship and settled in Belvidere, Illinois. When President Lincoln made a call for 300,000 more men to serve in the Union army, Jennie, aged 19, signed up. In those days there was no medical examination of recruits, beyond a quick glance at eyes and ears, Jennie became Albert D. J. Cashier, Private First Class, Co. 6, 95th Illinois Infantry Volunteers. The unit fought under Ulysses S. Grant (he was Irish, too) and 'PFC Cashier' saw service at the siege at Vicksburg, the Red River campaign, and the fierce fighting at Guntown, Mississippi. When the war ended, the volunteers were welcomed home as heroes and 'Albert' lived a quiet life as a 'bachelor' for 40 years. In 1911, 'Albert' was knocked down by a car driven by the State Senator, I. M. Lish. He and a doctor found 'Albert' was a woman, but pledged to keep her secret. 'Albert' was later admitted to the Soldiers' and Sailors' Home at Quincy, Illinois. It was only when 'Albert' became older and more frail that the authorities realised who 'he' was and admitted her to a women's hospital ward. 'Albert' died on October 10 1915 and was buried, in military uniform with honours. The remains were later moved to Saunemin for burial in Sunnyslope Cemetery, with full military honors. The townspeople of Saunemin erected a new and larger monument to mark the burial site on Memorial Day,' 1977.
[Source, www.geocities.com/pettigolass/hodgers]

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by darksplash.

Answer: Mark Twain

Twain's "Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc" purports to be a translation from the French of a memoir by Joan's page and secretary Louis de Conte. It was originally published in serialized form in Harper's Magazine in 1895, and is notably different in tone from much of Twain's other work. The reverential and predominantly solemn tone stand in stark contrast to the irreverence and roguish humor characteristic of Twain's best-known novels and stories, and it is generally regarded as one of his lesser works. George Bernard Shaw in particular took a dim view of the novel and accused Twain of having romanticized Joan with whom, in Shaw's view, he had become infatuated. Twain himself took a quite different view. "Personal Recollections" was the product of his lifelong fascination with the character and story of Joan, and he considered it to be his finest work. An element of personal sentiment no doubt also colored his judgment: he had based the character of Joan on his own seventeen year-old daughter Susie Clemens who, like Joan herself, was fated to die young. In 1896, the same year in which "Personal Recollections" appeared in book form, Susie died of spinal meningitis at the age of twenty-four, a blow from which Twain would never recover.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by jouen58.

Answer: Running in front of the king's horse during the Epsom Derby

Davison was a radical fighter in the cause of women's suffrage. She was prosecuted and imprisoned for her actions on no fewer than eight occasions, for varied misdemeanors ranging from setting fire to pillar boxes in the city of Westminster to assault on a Baptist minister who she mistook for Lloyd George.

The incident that caused her death happened at the 1913 Derby at the Epsom racecourse. As the horses rounded Tattenham Corner to enter the final straight, Davison ran out from the infield towards the king's horse, Anmar, carrying a suffragette's flag. The horse failed to stop; running straight into her, sending Davison crashing to the ground, unconscious and with her skull fractured. The horse's jockey was knocked unconscious and the horse suffered injuries that meant it had to be put down.

What Davison's intentions had been in entering the course is still a matter of debate. Some contemporaneous accounts suggest that she was merely planning to plant her flag in the ground and believed that all the horses had passed, whereas others claim she made a clear grab for Anmar's bridle in order to attach her flag to the horse.

Davison died in hospital four days later from her injuries. Sadly, her final actions proved to be more of a hindrance than a help to the movement she so nobly served. As a highly educated woman, with a first class degree from Oxford University, the patriarchs of the day argued that "If a highly educated woman was willing to do what she did, what could society expect of less educated women?"

Limited suffrage for women was achieved at the end of World War I in 1918 with universal suffrage finally achieved ten years later.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by Snowman.

Answer: "Little Men" the sequel to "Little Women" was based on Alcott's own marriage to an educator and the school they created together.

Although the beloved Jo character marries an older German professor and starts a school in which her own children and nephews and nieces are raised, Louisa May Alcott never married. Like many nineteenth century women, she apparently preferred the company of intelligent women to that of men. Her father Bronson May Alcott was a transcendentalist and began a school. Alcott eventually succumbed to the effects of mercury poisoning and is buried in Concord Massachusetts.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by Bruyere.

Answer: Anne Widdecombe

She first became the Conservative MP for Maidstone in 1987 (the constituency later became Maidstone and The Weald). She is a committed Christian, and has long been the butt of jokes and criticism from the 'liberal intelligentsia'. During the 1997 General Election, she gave probably her most famous quote about the then candidate Michael Howard, saying "there is something of the night about him". She went on to serve under him when he became Conservative leader in 2003. As to whether she is a 'maiden', she has consistently stated "I don't regard it as anybody else's business." All the wrong answers have been married.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by Quiz_Beagle.

Answer: Hildegard of Bingen

Hildegard of Bingen was the 10th child born to Hildebert and Mechthilde. She had visions throughout her life, and when she was 42, she began to write them down after she received what she felt were instructions from God. A neurologist, Oliver Sacks, has read her vivid descriptions of her physical symptoms and diagnosed her with migraines.

Not only was she an abbess, she was an author, artist, composer, scientist, physician, and linguist (she invented an alternative alphabet).

Among her many works is the "Ordo Virtutum," which is a morality play. It was created to be performed by the nuns at her abbey, and could be considered the birth of opera.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by SilverMoonsong.

Answer: Patricia Routledge

Patricia Routledge may have played the role of the arrogant middle-class wife trying to mingle with the upper crust so well as to make everyone see the "Hyacinths" in their own families, but she cannot draw upon any married life of her own.

She has been married to the theatre pretty much her whole life, having started out at the Liverpool Playhouse in the early 1950s. She has played a wide variety of roles, even playing every American First Lady from Abigail Adams to Eleanor Roosevelt on Broadway in a play called "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue!"

She has also acted on radio and in film, but of course, most now will forever remember her television work, first as Hyacinth in "Keeping Up Appearances", and then as a private detective in "Hetty Wainthropp Investigates".

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by Eauhomme.

Answer: Air Transport Auxiliary (ATA)

In February 2008, 15 women and 100 men surviving from the ATA were awarded special merit awards. These people were vital in delivering aircraft where they were needed. Miss Frost, a clergyman's daughter from Bwlchllan, Wales, was under the 5ft 4in minimum height and scared of heights! I would like to dedicate this question to all the ladies who have lost their lives fighting for freedom.

Question and Answer Developed for FT Players by Quiz_Beagle