It's a Long Way from LA to Denver Quiz

Answer: Santa Catalina

The 34th parallel runs through Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz, and just south of San Miguel. Santa Catalina is the easternmost of the eight islands, and the only one with several thousand permanent residents, most of them living in the city of Avalon, a popular resort community. Avalon was the inspiration for the song of the same name, written and first recorded by Al Jolson in 1920, which you might have heard being casually played on the piano in the movie 'Casablanca' by Dooley Wilson, immediately before he launches into 'As Time Goes By'.

Answer: Hiroshima

On the morning of 6 August 1945, at 8:15am local time, a USAAF bomber dropped an atomic bomb with the code name Little Boy on the city of Hiroshima. Most of the city was destroyed, and somewhere between 100,000 and 175,000 people died within the next six months as a direct result of the bombing.

The city was first established around 1600 as a castle town, and developed into an industrial centre during the second half of the 19th century, becoming officially designated as a city in 1889. It was a military centre of some significance, but most of the deaths caused by the atomic bomb were civilians.

The book 'Hiroshima' by John Hershey describes the lives of six survivors in the time immediately before the bombing, and during a period of four months afterwards.

It makes powerful reading.

Answer: False

Before the Korean War, the 38th parallel was the boundary between North Korea and South Korea. The Korean Armistice Agreement established a Demilitarized Zone about 4 km wide and 250 km long, the middle of which is the official border between the two disputants. The west end of the centre of the DMZ is slightly south of the 38th parallel, and the eastern end is further north of it; this means that the 38th parallel is often referred to as being the border, but the border crosses the parallel, rather than lying on it.

An unplanned side effect of maintaining a region from which virtually all human activity has been barred has been a resurgence of endangered native species. One of the best-established temperate habitat regions in the world, it sustains (among the land mines and military posts) several thousand species of plants, several hundred species of birds, and close to a hundred species of mammals. These include the red-crowned crane, the Korean fox, the Asiatic black bear and (in the marine portion) the Western gray whale.

Answer: China

Tibet's borders were fluid following the fall of the Tibetan Empire, as much of the eastern part was not under the control of the Tibetan government, located in the southwest of the plateau. The eastern area was controlled variously by the Lhasa government and the Chinese government over several centuries, until the end of the Qing dynasty in 1912 led to the Tibetan government declaring its independence, which was not recognized by the Chinese Republic.

In 1951, the Chinese forcibly regained control of the entirety of Tibet, and abolished its regional government in 1959 to put an end to rebellion in the region.

The ethnic Tibetans, and the Tibetan Buddhists whose religious leader (the Dalai Lama) has been forced into exile, continue to consider themselves an invaded nation.

Answer: Rhodes

There are several different lists of ancient wonders, with slight variations in their inclusions, but the generally accepted list (in order of construction) is: Great Pyramid of Giza (the oldest, and the only one still in existence), the Hanging Gardens of Babylon (which may or may not have been in Babylon, or may not even have existed), the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, and the Colossus of Rhodes (the first one to be destroyed, due to an earthquake around 225 BCE).

The Colossus of Rhodes was a statue of the Greek god Helios, constructed under the guidance of the sculptor Chares between 292 and 280 BCE, to celebrate the city's successful defence during a year-long siege. Exactly how he produced the massive bronze castings that were required is not known for sure, although plausible suggestions have been put forward.

It is believed that most of the metal was obtained by melting the armour and weapons left behind by the besieging army when they left. Sitting on a white marble pedestal that stood 15 metres high, the 32-metre statue made quite an impressive sight - although its exact location near the harbour is not known.

Answer: Sicily

Majorca is Spanish, Crete is Greek, and Cyprus is an independent nation. The five largest islands in the Mediterranean are, in order: Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, Corsica and Crete. The island of Sicily is an autonomous region of Italy, from which it is separated by the Strait of Messina.

It is the large triangular shape that Italy's toe seems to be trying to kick. Sicily is home to Mount Etna, one of the most active volcanoes in the world. Mount Etna is high enough to feature two ski resorts, despite its location well south of Europe's main snow fields.

Answer: It is the most southerly point of the European mainland

Punta de Tarifa (also called Punta Marroqui) was formerly an island, but is now connected to mainland Spain by a causeway. It is located in the Strait of Gibraltar, which connects the Atlantic and Mediterranean oceans. The narrowest point in the strait is between Point Marroqui in Spain and Point Cires in Morocco, a distance of around 13 km.

The island of Tarifa derived its name from the fact that it was the place from which the Moorish invasion of Spain was launched by Tarif ibn Malik in 711.

Answer: Ponies on a nearby island

The town of Chincoteague is essentially the same as the island of the same name, plus some maritime areas. While many are familiar with the name, possibly from the Marguerite Henry book 'Misty of Chincoteague' or the movie based on it, the island where the ponies actually live is the nearby Assateague Island.

There are several stories about how the Chincoteague ponies arrived on Assateague, but what is definitely known is that the population of feral ponies became large enough by the early 19th century to make collecting them for sale (along with the sheep that also roamed the islands) a lucrative activity.

In 1924 the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company held the first official Pony Penning Day, on which ponies are auctioned to raise money for the fire company.

In the 21st century, the pony population on Assateague is in two packs - the Maryland or Assateague herd is managed by the National Parks Service, while the Virginia or Chincoteague herd is managed by the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company, and are allowed to roam the island by permit.

Answer: Massachusetts

Surveyors played an important part in settling disputes in the developing United States of America. There are a number of states whose borders were defined in reference to parallels, as opposed to using natural features such as rivers or mountain ranges.

The Mason-Dixon Line was originally set out between 1763 and 1767 to settle boundary disputes between colonies which had been given contradictory land grants. The portion of their line that established the border between Pennsylvania (on the north) and Maryland (on the south) at 39°43'20" (with a few deviations of up to 5") came to be recognised as the boundary between free states and slave states, or more generally in cultural terms the North and the South.

When new states were joining the union during the 19th century, the issue of whether or not slavery would be allowed in them was a matter of much debate, leading to the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which allowed Missouri to be admitted as a slave state, with the proviso that it would forever be the only slave state north of 30°30'.

Answer: Los Alamos National Laboratory

The Manhattan Project, created for the development of nuclear weapons, had several sites, including Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee and the Hanford Site in the state of Washington, which worked primarily on the development of fuel. It was felt that a more remote location was appropriate for the development of the actual weapons, and Los Alamos Ranch Boys School was purchased for the purpose. (Goodness knows what alumni Gore Vidal and William S Burroughs would have had to say if consulted!) It was in Los Alamos, the headquarters of the project, that many of the most respected physicists of the time were assembled - and where the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were constructed.

After World War II, nuclear research continued to focus on weapons development, but after the end of the Cold War (during the 1990s) the focus shifted to peacetime uses of nuclear technology and other areas of scientific research. Los Alamos is part of the Department of energy, and undertakes work for other government agencies such as the Department of Defense, the Intelligence Community, and the Department of Homeland Security.