History Through TIME Magazine Covers Quiz

Answer: Joseph Cannon, the retiring Speaker of the House fondly called "the grand old man of Congress"

In the cover story, TIME called the 86-year-old Joseph Gurney Cannon the "grand old man of Congress," and wrote the following:

"Uncle Joe is something more than a politician with an age-record. He is the embodiment of a tradition, a political theory, a technique of party government and discipline that is fast perishing. He represents the Old Guard in the very flower of its maturity, in the palmy days of McKinley and Mark Hanna, when 'a little group of wilful men' did more than make gestures of government; they actually ruled Congress, shrewdly, impregnably, and without too much rhetoric."

Answer: Hugo Stinnes, German coal magnate, attempting to control all European steel

TIME, while writing from a U.S. point of view, has always attempted to be an international news magazine. Stinnes was featured on the cover of the third issue released, very early indeed.

The cover story opens:

"Crafty, potent, indurate, Herr Hugo Stinnes, coal magnate, multimillionaire, present 'All-Highest' of Germany, plots a coal victory in the Ruhr. His aim is the control of the European steel industries, and, like all mysterious figures who move in the no-man's-land of international politics, he stands to win whichever side comes out on top. At present it suits Stinnes to back his own country."

Answer: Nuthall had just lost her quarterfinals match in the Tennis Championship at Wimbleton

It seems to me quite unusual for TIME to have a cover story on someone who lost a sporting event. But Betty Nuthall had been the odds on favorite, was quite photogenic--TIME reports she was known as the most photographed woman in England--and it's likely they had the story ready for her victory and had nothing to take its place when she didn't win.

It is also significant that the few women on early TIME covers were included for "soft" cultural reasons.

Answer: U.S. Ambassador to Britain, Joseph Kennedy, hard-working and scrupulously neutral U.S. representative

Joseph Kennedy, father of US President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, had presidential ambitions of his own. His activity at the time of Britain's declaration of war and his careful and strict neutrality as he represented the United States forwarded his political chances.

But only a year later Kennedy destroyed those chances by asserting in a "Boston Globe" interview: "Democracy is finished in England. It may be here." ... "It isn't that [Britain is] fighting for democracy. That's the bunk. She's fighting for self-preservation, just as we will if it comes to us ... I know more about the European situation than anybody else, and it's up to me to see that the country gets it." As soon as President Roosevelt heard what Kennedy had said, he arranged for Kennedy's resignation.

Answer: Winston Churchill, Britain's wartime prime minister

In the article's close, TIME quoted Churchill's own words to describe who he was and had been: "Nothing is more dangerous in wartime than to live in the temperamental atmosphere of a Gallup poll, always feeling one's pulse and taking one's temperature. I see [it said that] leaders should keep their ears to the ground. All I can say is that the British nation will find it very hard to look up to leaders who are detected in that somewhat ungainly posture."

In my own opinion, another Churchill quote summed him up even better: "Never have so many owed so much to so few."

The following web site gives you the entire cover and cover story and is well worth while:
http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19500102,00.html

Answer: Charles Van Doren, egghead hero on the quiz show "Twenty One," who won more money than had been won on any other quiz show

Shortly after the TIME cover, the story broke that "Twenty One" was fixed--the show had been feeding the questions to Van Doren ahead of time. Van Doren left the show, which in turn closed. Van Doren also had to resign his faculty post at Columbia University.

In 1994 Ralph Fiennes played Van Doren in the feature film "Quiz Show."

Answer: Strikes and riots had forced DeGaulle to stand for re-election

DeGaulle won the June 1968 elections handily, his Gaullist party winning 358 of 487 seats. However, he resigned on April 28, 1969, when his proposed reform of the government was defeated in a national referendum.

Answer: Ford's Republican primary challenger Ronald Reagan named Pennsylvania senator Richard Schweiker as his running mate

California Governor Reagan's gamble did not pay off. Naming Schweiker cost him votes and made Ford's race for the Republican nomination much less tight. However, he went on to lose to Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter in the general election. Most pundits believe that Ford's pardon of Nixon caused him to lose re-election.

Answer: At the end of a promising summit meeting, Reagan and Gorbachev could not agree on the proposed US "Star Wars" defense

The TIME cover story began:
"It had the potential, or so it seemed for a while, of producing the most sweeping arms control agreement in the history of the nuclear age. The most dramatic proposal was to slash in half the long-range nuclear missiles in the arsenals of the superpowers and eventually eliminate them altogether. Until a half-hour before the meeting broke up on Sunday evening, virtually all the pieces seemed to be in place. Yet in the end, the Iceland summit broke down over a single word: laboratory.
"After two intensive days of bargaining, Mikhail Gorbachev would not relent in his insistence that Ronald Reagan's cherished Strategic Defense Initiative, designed to serve as a space-based shield against ballistic missiles, be confined to "laboratory research." And Reagan was equally adamant that the U.S. retain the right not only to conduct scientific research on new Star Wars weapons but to develop and test them as well."

Answer: President-elect George W. Bush, Person of the Year

All are real TIME covers from that general time period, except that Bradley shared the cover with other primary candidates. However, if you remember that technically the new century began on January 1, 2001, the answer becomes much more obvious. And yes, TIME's Einstein cover was a year early--as they later admitted in small print.