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Quiz about September 20th Matches Hatches Dispatches
Quiz about September 20th Matches Hatches Dispatches

September 20th: Matches, Hatches, Dispatches Quiz


September 20th is my wife's birthday so I thought I'd write this quiz for her. It's a lot less expensive than a diamond after all.

A multiple-choice quiz by Snowman. Estimated time: 6 mins.
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Author
Snowman
Time
6 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
316,786
Updated
Dec 03 21
# Qns
10
Difficulty
Average
Avg Score
8 / 10
Plays
1038
Awards
Top 5% quiz!
Last 3 plays: Guest 82 (9/10), joyland (9/10), Guest 12 (7/10).
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Question 1 of 10
1. September 20th was a day to remember for a man who first came to public prominence in "Beyond the Fringe" in 1961 before further success came with "Not Only ... But Also". A move to Hollywood beckoned and with a performance in Blake Edwards' "10" in 1979, super-stardom came. On this day in 1975 he married the Hollywood actress Tuesday Weld. Who was he? Hint


Question 2 of 10
2. On this day in 1486 was born a prince who was the eldest son of a king of England, the elder brother of a future king of England and the husband of a future queen of England. Sadly, he died at the tender age of fifteen and was never able to claim the crown for himself. Who was this young prince whose father started a brief dynasty that significantly changed English history? Hint


Question 3 of 10
3. This man's achievements as a linguist are considerable, including the "Deutsches Wörterbuch", the German equivalent of the "Oxford English Dictionary". However, it is as a collector of fairy tales that this man's name is best known. Working with his brother on most of his projects, he brought "Little Red Riding Hood" and "Rumplestiltskin" to popular attention. Who was this man that died on September 20th, 1863? Hint


Question 4 of 10
4. James Dewar, who was born on this day in 1842, was a clever man. His great invention still sometimes bears his name but is more commonly known by the name of the German company who produced the first commercial version in 1904. A container that maintains the temperature of its liquid contents by being surrounded by a cavity that is emptied of air, by what name is Dewar's invention best known? Hint


Question 5 of 10
5. Jean Sibelius, who died on this day in 1957, was a key figure in 20th century orchestral composition. He also played an instrumental role in the development of his nation's national identity. His symphonies were often inspired by his nation's literature and folk tales and the work for which he is best known was a musical tableau representing his nation's history and a protest against the oppression of Russian rule. What was the name of this piece? Hint


Question 6 of 10
6. September 20th had been a happy day for Lithuanian-born Asa Yoelson. On that date in 1907, he married dancer Henrietta Keller. Sadly, their marriage was to end in divorce before he gained his place in film history as the first man to speak dialogue in a full-length motion picture. By what name was Asa better known? Hint


Question 7 of 10
7. Though his namesake author might be better known, this naval officer has his own place in British popular culture. As Lord Nelson lay dying on the deck of HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar, he allegedly asked this first officer to kiss him (although many suspect that the actual word he used was the more fatalistic "kismet"). Who was the officer, who died on September 20th, 1839, to which this remark was directed? Hint


Question 8 of 10
8. Born on September 20th, 1885, Ferdinand LaMothe was an early and crucial pioneer in the world of jazz. A pianist and composer of such jazz standards as "Wolverine Blues" and "Black Bottom Stomp", his was the first jazz tune to be published as sheet music. This first publication shared its title with part of his stage name, which was what? Hint


Question 9 of 10
9. September 20th, 1947, saw the death of a politician who had been, up until just two years previously, the mayor of New York City. His 11 year stint in the job saw a huge amount of investment in public housing and public spaces and a revitalisation of the city. His popularity was such that a new airport built in the city during his tenure was named after him. Who was he? Hint


Question 10 of 10
10. To end the quiz, the second most glamorous woman born on this day. In 1934, she came into the world in Rome, Italy and embarked on an acting career that would bring fame, fortune and awards by the busload. In 1962, she became the first actress to win an Oscar for a non-English speaking role in "Two Women" before landing starring roles in Hollywood epics such as "El Cid" and "The Fall of the Roman Empire". Who was this screen siren? Hint



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Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. September 20th was a day to remember for a man who first came to public prominence in "Beyond the Fringe" in 1961 before further success came with "Not Only ... But Also". A move to Hollywood beckoned and with a performance in Blake Edwards' "10" in 1979, super-stardom came. On this day in 1975 he married the Hollywood actress Tuesday Weld. Who was he?

Answer: Dudley Moore

Each of the four people mentioned was a member of "Beyond The Fringe", a revue written and performed by the four Oxbridge graduates, beginning in 1960. It was hugely popular in its day but its value is appreciated beyond its stage and TV life thanks to the inspiration it provided to future comedians and satirists. Whilst Bennett was to find future success as the writer of such plays as "The Madness of George III" and "The History Boys" and Miller became a leading director of opera, Moore and Cook, or Pete 'n' Dud as they became known, continued as comedy performers. Their two-hander sketch show, "Not Only... But Also" was one of the most popular comedy series of the 1960s in Britain. It led to movie opportunities, the best of which were "Bedazzled" and "The Wrong Box".

Moore and Cook finally split in the mid 1970s as Moore struggled to deal with Cook's alcoholism and Moore moved to Hollywood to concentrate on his movie career. After '10' made him a star, Moore achieved his biggest hit with 'Arthur', for which he received an Oscar nomination and Golden Globe win as Best Actor.

Moore became afflicted with progressive supranuclear palsy in 1999 and the degenerative physical nature of the disease led to numerous complications. One of these, pneumonia, led to his early death in 2002 at the age of 66.
2. On this day in 1486 was born a prince who was the eldest son of a king of England, the elder brother of a future king of England and the husband of a future queen of England. Sadly, he died at the tender age of fifteen and was never able to claim the crown for himself. Who was this young prince whose father started a brief dynasty that significantly changed English history?

Answer: Arthur Tudor

Arthur Tudor was the son of Henry VII and brother of Henry VIII. His wife was Catherine of Aragon, who married the younger Henry after Arthur's death. When Catherine failed to produce a son for Henry, he used the fact of her previous marriage to Arthur to engineer an annulment of the marriage, which precipitated a break from Rome for the English church.

The cause of Arthur's death is not known for certain but it came quickly and unexpectedly. The two most likely suspects are the sweating sickness, a virulent disease that caused many deaths during Tudor times, and tuberculosis, the Tudor family disease. TB was also responsible for the death, aged 15, of Edward VI in 1558.
3. This man's achievements as a linguist are considerable, including the "Deutsches Wörterbuch", the German equivalent of the "Oxford English Dictionary". However, it is as a collector of fairy tales that this man's name is best known. Working with his brother on most of his projects, he brought "Little Red Riding Hood" and "Rumplestiltskin" to popular attention. Who was this man that died on September 20th, 1863?

Answer: Jacob Grimm

The brothers Grimm began their dictionary in 1838 and by the time of Jacob's death in 1863 the project had only reached the letter F. Wilhelm, the younger of the brothers, had died four years previously, so the project was continued by a number of institutions, with the last volume published in 1961.

The brothers Grimm published their first edition of "Children's and Household Tales" in 1812. The tales were transcribed from stories told to them by people from all across Germany. The first volume contained 86 tales, such as "Hansel and Gretel" and "Rapunzel", and was criticised as being too academic in tone and inaccessible to children. By the time of their death, they had issued seven editions of the tales, totalling 211 tales and also a special collection for children of 50 of the stories.
4. James Dewar, who was born on this day in 1842, was a clever man. His great invention still sometimes bears his name but is more commonly known by the name of the German company who produced the first commercial version in 1904. A container that maintains the temperature of its liquid contents by being surrounded by a cavity that is emptied of air, by what name is Dewar's invention best known?

Answer: Thermos flask

Dewar was a physicist and chemist who achieved many things beyond the invention of the Dewar flask. Amongst his great experiments was to demonstrate that the so-called permanent gases, such as hydrogen and helium, were anything but by reducing them to a low enough temperature to liquefy.

His flask was a by-product of this research as he sought a way to keep the substances liquid for long enough periods to be able to examine their properties in this state. Sadly, for Dewar, he didn't patent his invention and lost a court case against the Thermos company of Germany when he tried to prevent his design from being copied.
5. Jean Sibelius, who died on this day in 1957, was a key figure in 20th century orchestral composition. He also played an instrumental role in the development of his nation's national identity. His symphonies were often inspired by his nation's literature and folk tales and the work for which he is best known was a musical tableau representing his nation's history and a protest against the oppression of Russian rule. What was the name of this piece?

Answer: Finlandia

Sibelius is an important cultural figure in Finland and his image graced the Finnish 100 mark bill (before the introduction of the Euro). After giving up the law to concentrate on music, he wrote seven symphonies, his style progressing from Wagnerian to Romantic over their course. His use of the orchestra was highly influential and he has been described as "arguably as important to early 20th-century music as Ezra Pound was to literary modernism".

"Finlandia" was written in 1899, the last of seven musical pieces written to be performed together in front of a backdrop of artworks depicting the glories of Finnish history. The performance was part of a series of celebrations, recognising the role of the Finnish press in maintaining national identity in the face of increasing censorship from the ruling Russian elite.

Part of "Finlandia" was re-written as a stand alone piece called the "Finlandia Hymn" that became a national song after Finland's independence was gained in 1917. Curiously, the western African breakaway nation of Biafra, which briefly attempted to gain independence from Nigeria in the late 1960s, used this tune as its national anthem.
6. September 20th had been a happy day for Lithuanian-born Asa Yoelson. On that date in 1907, he married dancer Henrietta Keller. Sadly, their marriage was to end in divorce before he gained his place in film history as the first man to speak dialogue in a full-length motion picture. By what name was Asa better known?

Answer: Al Jolson

The film was "The Jazz Singer" (1927) and the first words of dialogue, "Wait a minute, wait a minute, you ain't heard nothin' yet," came a quarter of an hour into the film. As he also preferred to do on stage, Jolson performed the song and dance sequences in the film made up in blackface.

Despite how this may appear to modern sensibilities, Jolson was respected for his fight against discrimination against black performers in the USA.
7. Though his namesake author might be better known, this naval officer has his own place in British popular culture. As Lord Nelson lay dying on the deck of HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar, he allegedly asked this first officer to kiss him (although many suspect that the actual word he used was the more fatalistic "kismet"). Who was the officer, who died on September 20th, 1839, to which this remark was directed?

Answer: Thomas Hardy

Whilst his place in popular history rests entirely on his presence at Nelson's scene of death, Sir Thomas Hardy had a distinguished military career of his own. He played a significant role in engagements in Portugal and the War of 1812 against the United States. By 1830, he had risen to head the British navy as the First Naval Lord and when he died, in 1839, he was rewarded with burial in the Royal Naval College in Greenwich.

Thomas Hardy, the novelist, was responsible for such masterpieces as "The Mayor of Casterbridge" and "Far From the Madding Crowd".
8. Born on September 20th, 1885, Ferdinand LaMothe was an early and crucial pioneer in the world of jazz. A pianist and composer of such jazz standards as "Wolverine Blues" and "Black Bottom Stomp", his was the first jazz tune to be published as sheet music. This first publication shared its title with part of his stage name, which was what?

Answer: Jelly Roll Morton

"Jelly Roll Blues", first composed in 1905, was published in 1915 and was an undoubted first in jazz, a musical form that had hitherto been based around free-form improvisation of tunes learned by ear. A less certain pioneering claim that Morton made for himself was that he had invented jazz itself. However dubious this claim may be, he was certainly a key figure in its development and its growing popularity.

He began his career as a pianist in a brothel, and was inspired by the ragtime tunes played by his peers. When his family discovered where he was playing, he was kicked out of his home in disgrace and started life as a travelling musician. He started composing and through his travelling, he helped introduce the sound of New Orleans to other parts of the United States.
9. September 20th, 1947, saw the death of a politician who had been, up until just two years previously, the mayor of New York City. His 11 year stint in the job saw a huge amount of investment in public housing and public spaces and a revitalisation of the city. His popularity was such that a new airport built in the city during his tenure was named after him. Who was he?

Answer: Fiorello La Guardia

La Guardia came to power in New York City at a time when the nation was suffering the Great Depression. Despite being a Republican, he was a fervent supporter of President Roosevelt's New Deal initiative and, as a consequence, secured significant government funding for the city. Much of this money was invested in public works; roads, tunnels, bridges and taking the subway system into public hands.

The final key to his transportational plan was to construct a commercial airport within the city's limits, a plan inspired through annoyance at having to land at Newark in New Jersey in order to access the city. In 1937, development began to transform a small airfield in Queens, known as North Beach airport, into a airport capable of taking commercial airliners. It was opened in 1939 as the New York Municipal Airport. Just three months before LaGuardia's death, the airport was renamed in his honour.
10. To end the quiz, the second most glamorous woman born on this day. In 1934, she came into the world in Rome, Italy and embarked on an acting career that would bring fame, fortune and awards by the busload. In 1962, she became the first actress to win an Oscar for a non-English speaking role in "Two Women" before landing starring roles in Hollywood epics such as "El Cid" and "The Fall of the Roman Empire". Who was this screen siren?

Answer: Sophia Loren

Loren was born Sofia Scicolone and made her first movie appearance, aged 16, in the 1951 Hollywood adaptation of Henryk Sienkiewicz's novel "Quo Vadis?". A year later, she changed her stage name to Loren and embarked on a film career in her native Italy. Five years later she returned to American films with "Boy on a Dolphin" and signed a contract with Paramount. However, her first award-winning role came when she returned to Italy to make "Two Women", a film about a mother trying to protect her daughter from the ever-present dangers in war-torn Italy.

Loren became one of the world's most famous and most photographed women of the 1960s, inspiring admiration and desire amongst hundreds of men. One of those men was Peter Sellers, who reportedly left his first wife due to his love for Loren, even though Loren did not have reciprocal feelings.
Source: Author Snowman

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor bloomsby before going online.
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