The 20th Century - 1951-1960 Trivia Quiz

Answer: Pan American Games

The very first edition of the Pan American Games took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1951. The games are open to nations throughout North and South America and take place every four years in the year before the Summer Olympics take place.

Answer: 25

Princess Elizabeth, eldest daughter of George VI, was born in April 1926. On February 6th, 1952, she was in Kenya with her husband Philip when she received the news that her father had died. At just 25 years of age, she was now Queen. She would go on to reign for over 70 years before her death in September, 2022.

Answer: Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union, died after a cerebral hemorrhage on May %th, 1953. He was buried in Red Square beside Lenin but his mummified corpse was removed in 1961.
Hideki Tojo, Prime Minster of Japan, was executed in 1948; Winston Churchill, UK Prime Minister, died in 1965; and U.S. President Harry S Truman passed away in 1972.

Answer: France

The Battle of Dien Bien Phu was a key battle in the First Indochina War, which would lead to France relinquishing her territories in the area, and the partition of Vietnam along the 17th parallel. The Viet Minh were a communist orgenaistion led by Ho Chi Minh, with troops from South Vietnam and the USA among those who supported the French army.

Answer: Rock Around the Clock

Bill Haley and the Comets recorded "Rock Around the Clock" in 1954, but it was in the following year that it became a smash hit, following its use in the film "Blackboard Jungle".

Answer: Calypso

Born in 1910, Jacques Cousteau was a French naval officer before embarking on a career in oceanography. He co-invented the aqualung along with Emile Gagnan. In 1950, he leased the Calypso, a former British minesweeper, turning it into a research ship.

Answer: Sputnik I

Sputnik I was launched by the Soviet Union on October 4, 1957 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in present-day Kazakhstan. It was the first artificial Earth satellite, and fell back to Earth in January of the following year.

Answer: Linus Pauling

Linus Pauling was born in Portland, Oregon in 1901. He was a founding father of quantum chemistry and molecular biology. In 1945 he became a peace activist. He won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1954 and the Nobel Peace Prize in 1962.

Answer: United Kingdom

The six founding member nations of the Common Market, known at the time as the European Coal and Steel Community, were France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. The goal was the elimination of tariffs and other trade barriers. The United Kingdom eventually joined in 1973, then left in 2020.

Answer: Argentina

Adolf Eichmann was an SS officer who was regarded as one of the major organizers of the holocaust during World War 2. He escaped from American captivity at the end of the war and, after living under an assumed name in Saxony, moved to Argentina using false papers. Mossad agents became aware of his hiding place and kidnapped him in 1960, and brought him to Israel to stand trial.

He was executed in 1962.