During, But Not About: USA's Ninth Presidency Quiz

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. One day into William Henry Harrison's presidency, the United States senate experienced a filibuster. The members of the 27th U.S. senate talked at length in order to prevent any sort of legislation. On which issue was the filibuster concerning?

Answer: Senate printers

The issue came between the Whigs and Democrats. At this time, documents were printed by private printers, who were either supporters or critics of a political party. The filibuster came with the incoming Whig party majority and a desire to replace the Democrat-leaning printers of the time. The Whigs won the debate on March 11, six days after the filibuster had occurred.

2. Which politician had, in March 1841, been challenged to a duel by Alabama senator William King over the slander of "Washington Globe" senate printer Francis Blair in March of Harrison's presidency?

Answer: Henry Clay

Kentucky senator Henry Clay had already served as Secretary of the State under John Quincy Adams over a decade before this incident. When the topic of senate printers came upon the senate, Clay had debased Blair and the "Washington Post" as infamous. King defended Blair, and Clay lost his temper with the both of them. After the meeting, King challenged Clay to the duel.

Both men were arrested by the senate police before anything could come of it, and on the 14th of March, both men apologized to one another for their actions.

3. Supreme Court -- Beginning in 1839, slaves from Cuba took over the Amistad vessel and mutinied, attempting to force the remaining Cuban shipmates to take them back to Africa. On March 9th, what decision did the Supreme Court come to concerning the mutinied slaves?

Answer: They would be free to return to Africa

The decision to free these slaves was due to their being enslaved illegally. The Transatlantic Slave Trade was abolished in 1807 in the U.S., but these slaves had been recently captured, thus being obtained after the abolition date. Although freeing these slaves was opposed by Martin van Buren, John Quincy Adams fought for their freedom. By the time Harrison was president, the slaves were free to return to Africa, despite protests from Cuba and Spain.

Several of these slaves went to West Africa, while others still went to the homeland. One returned to study in Ohio and became a missionary for Sierra Leone.

4. Far East -- With which nation was China warring at this time in the First Opium War, which had begun 1� years before Harrison's presidency?

Answer: Great Britain

The Opium Wars began when Great Britain began taking opium from the EITC and selling it to Chinese citizens in order to find something to trade for the large quantities of tea it bought from them. This led to addiction among the Chinese citizens. The Chinese government kicked in to stop the opium trade, and Britain attacked them for this.

During Harrison's one-month presidency, representatives from both nations wanted to make settlements to stop the war, but neither government was willing to accept the terms. The First Opium War ended over a year later with the Treaty of Nanjing and The Treaty of Humen/the Bogue, which forced China to increase ports open for trade with Britain, give up Hong Kong, and give Britain "most-favored nation" status.

5. The year 1841 was an eventful year for one particular civilization. Two explorers named John Lloyd Stephens and Frederick Cheatwood returned from Central America to write a report on their findings. In October 1841, they made a second trip to Central America for further research; during Harrison's presidency, their findings were either about to be published, or were being rabidly consumed by eager American masses. Of which civilization was this book a study of?

Answer: The Mayans

"Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan" was published in 1841, and was well-received. It provides great detail about the explorers' travels from October 3rd, 1839 to their landing in Belize, their travelling around Central America and their return to New York on July 31st, 1840. The study provided new and significantly profound information on the Mayan culture - knowledge that hadn't been available to the world at that time.

They left for the Yucatan in October 1841 to undertake another expedition.

6. Edgar Allan Poe had his first detective story published in April 1841. What is the name of this story, which first featured C. Auguste Dupin in a crime in Paris?

Answer: The Murders in the Rue Morgue

"The Murder in the Rue Morgue" was published the month of Harrison's untimely death. It deals with several murders in Paris, and C. Auguste Dupin goes down the path of Sherlock Holmes and Inspector Closeau to solve them (though Dupin predates both of them). The story is told by an unnamed narrator, who just so happens to be Dupin's roommate.

7. Solomon Northup was offered a job as a fiddler by two men in March 1841. He obliged, and soon afterwards he was taken to work for 12 years against his will. He detailed his kidnapping and release in his memoir, "Narrative of Solomon Northup, a Citizen of New-York, Kidnapped in Washington City in 1841, and Rescued in 1853, From a Cotton Plantation Near the Red River, in Louisiana." People may know this by its first four words, which is the title of a 2013 drama starring Chiwetel Ejiofor. What is the movie title, or the first four words of his memoir title?

Answer: 12 Years a Slave

Solomon was a free man in New York who had been taken to Washington D.C., where slavery was still legal, and worked in Louisiana for 12 years. He was released after proof of his being a free man surfaced, and two years later he published his memoir. This, along with Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" being published in 1850, spurred abolitionist sentiments at that time.

8. During Harrison's presidency, which future president was having relationship issues with who would become his wife?

Answer: Abraham Lincoln

In the early part of 1841, Abraham Lincoln was readying himself to marry Mary Todd. For some reason, he left the relationship for about two years. They wed on November 24th, 1842, long after John Tyler had taken the office after Harrison's death.

The other three choices were married in the 1810s and 1820s.

9. Major news rocked America and Britain when, on March 12th, a British passenger liner was lost at sea, with Irish captain Richard Roberts being lost with it. What was the name of this vessel?

Answer: SS President

Richard Roberts, who was known for saying "I'd go to sea in a bathtub," was given this ship after sailing the SS Sirius across the Atlantic (a massive feat at the time). The SS President was overloaded with cargo at the time it went down, and it was lost at sea with 136 passengers.

This resulted in the British and American Steam Navigation Company collapsing.

10. March 1841 saw the death of French physicist F�lix Savart, who dealt with acoustics and, along with fellow physicist Jean-Baptiste Biot, discovered a formula for the creation of a magnetic field due to an electric current (now known as the Biot-Savart law). But Harrison's brief presidency also saw the birth of a noted scientist. On April 3rd, one day before Harrison's death, Hermann Carl Vogel was born in Leipzig, Germany. He would go on to make contributions to which scientific field?

Answer: Astronomy

Vogel's work consisted of advancing astronomical photography and spectroscopy. He was able to show that the sun's photosphere rotated by observing sunspots, and measured the velocity of stars for classification purposes. Using spectroscopy, he also studied other planets.

Source: Author Not_Worthy

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor bloomsby before going online.
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William Henry Harrison's U.S. presidency lasted from March 4th to April 4th, 1841, just 30 days. This quiz is about events that happened during his presidency, without being directly related to it.

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