Library Reference Stumper
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Bill
Leone, Head of Access Services and creator of the Reference
Stumper, presents a |
To solve the "Quote," contestants must identify both the author and the title of the work from which the quote was taken. Look for the "Stumper" each month on the last page of our newsletter, or on this page. Winners receive a T-shirt and have the option of having their picture appear for one month on the library’s web page.
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SEPTEMBER 2010 STUMPER Quote of the Month: "Fourteen thousand years ago, in what is now France, a remote Ice Age ancestor took a walk with a young child into what many of us today would think of as a dark and forbidding place. Deep in an underground cave the adult held the child's hand against a wall and blew pigment over it, leaving a shadowlike imprint of a tiny hand that remain to this very day." Brain Teaser: This regularly scheduled television drama ran for 11 years. What was the title of the first drama produced on this program and what actor played the leading role? AUGUST 2010 STUMPER Quote of the Month: "There is hardly one religion in the world which fails to extol godhead as truth, or beauty. God is truth, we are constantly reminded. God is truth; God is beauty. Well then, if these properties of godhead are universally acknowledged, can we not then simply agree among ourselves there wherever we find truth, then an element of godhead is present? We need not go so far as to conclude that wherever we find truth, wisdom and beauty there also exists godhead, no." Brain Teaser: Who were the first husband and wife to win Oscars for their acting performances in a motion picture? |
The
winner chosen will be the first person to answer both parts of the
"Stumper" correctly. Answer to "Quote of the Month" must include title
AND author.
Participants may submit their responses in 3 ways:
1) E-mail to: wkslibry@uhls.lib.ny.us
2) Telephone the Information Desk at 810-0314.
3) By stopping off at the Access Services desk in the library.
JULY 2010 STUMPER No Winner
Quote of the Month: "Fourteen thousand years ago, in what is now France, a remote Ice Age ancestor took a walk with a young child into what many of us today would think of as a dark and forbidding place. Deep in an underground cave the adult held the child's hand against a wall and blew pigment over it, leaving a shadowlike imprint of a tiny hand that remain to this very day."
Brain Teaser: This regularly scheduled television drama ran for 11 years. What was the title of the first drama produced on this program and what actor played the leading role?
JUNE
2010 STUMPER (Winner:
Naomi King, 6/30/10)
Quote
of the Month: "If there is some kind of life after death,
what if it's not a life exclusively for the dead? What if it's a life
available to us all, as Harvey argues, something the living can participate
in, too? Just after someone has died, this life sometimes becomes
briefly and intensely visible and what? Inhabitable?"
Answer:
"Practicing Resurrection: A Memoir of Work, Doubt, Discernment,
and Moments of Grace" by Nora Gallagher
Brain
Teaser: What is the name of the first American book review editor
and where did the editorials appear?
Answer: Margaret Fuller, who wrote for the New York
Tribune.
MAY 2010 STUMPER No Winner
Quote
of the Month: "I don't believe there is such a thing as a
good way to die. Death to me is a wasteful
obscenity. You spend your life mastering tasks, cultivating knowledge
and opinions, gradually getting the hang of living in your skin and
skull, when it all must be disposed of to make room for the latest
models coming up from behind."
Brain
Teaser: What
was the name of the author of an 18th century English satirical poem
which mocked
nearly all the famous actors of the day?
Quote of the Month: "Reason is a means of finding truths through deductive and inductive logic. These truths may be valuable in themselves in helping us to understand who we are (theory of evolution), but they have also, through medicine, for instance, transformed human life. We are free to apply the fruits of reasoned thought to some of our greatest needs, in many areas with enormous success."
Brain Teaser: What was the name of the first television drama program regularly scheduled and what was the name of the first drama it presented?
MARCH 2010 STUMPER No Winner
Quote
of the Month: "There is hardly one religion in the world which
fails to extol godhead as truth, or
beauty. God is truth, we are constantly reminded. God is truth; God
is beauty. Well then, if these properties of godhead are universally
acknowledged, can we not then simply agree among ourselves there wherever
we find truth, then an element of godhead is present? We need not go
so far as to conclude that wherever we find truth, wisdom and beauty
there also exists godhead, no."
Brain Teaser: What is the name of the first movie to cost more than $100 million to make and who was the star of the movie?
FEBRUARY 2010 STUMPER No Winner
Quote of the Month: "If intelligent life exists on other planets (and the consensus of astronomers and biochemists is that it does, in abundance), we cannot expect it to be hominoid, mammalian, eucaryotic, or even DNA based. We should rescue the contemplation of other civilizations from science fiction. Real science tries to characterize not just the real world but all possible worlds. It identifies them within the much vaster space of all conceivable worlds studied by philosophers and mathematicians."
Brain Teaser: What was the name of the first opera by an American composer performed in America and who was the composer?
JANUARY 2010 STUMPER No Winner
Quote of the Month: "Millennial expectations always fail, and their movements are left with a host of radical social practices that must now be reconciled with an unexpected and continuing life on the present earth. These novelties, now transferred from designs for the blessed millennium to devices for potential reform of the current order, often become a motor for major disruptions and transformations on the complex pathways of human history."
Brain Teaser: She was the star of the first made-for-TV movie?
DECEMBER 2009 STUMPER (Winner: Edward Mallgraf;12-28-09)
Quote
of the Month: "We have not yet reached the phase in which the
supremos of science can warn us that breathing is bad for the health,
or at least that starvation implies certain risks, but we know for a
fact that each individual only exploits a minimal portion of the brain's
potential. This finding suggests that the true key to life's adventure
is the unlocking of the floodgate of knowledge which is every person's
birthright, only just out of reach."
Answer: Essay entitled "In Praise of Laziness," by
Peter Ustinov, contained in Ustinov Still at Large.
Brain
Teaser: The first movie shown as a regular in-flight movie on an
airplane was called? What year was it shown?
Answer: Answer: By Love Possessed, shown on July 19, 1961.
[Trans World Airlines flight between New York and Los Angeles]
NOVEMBER 2009 STUMPER No Winner
Quote
of the Month: "War has always diminished our freedom. When
our freedom has been expanded, it has not come as a result of war or
of anything the government has done but as a result of what citizens
have done. The best test of that is the history of black people in the
United States, the history of slavery and of segregation. It wasn't
the government that initiated the movement against slavery but white
and black abolitionists. It wasn't the government that initiated the
battle against racial segregation in the 1950s and 1960s, but the movement
of people in the South."
Answer: Terrorism and War by Howard Zinn
Brain
Teaser: This was the first radio broadcast of a complete opera featuring
a professional cast. Who sang
the leading female role?
Answer: Samson et Dalila with the role of Dalila sung by Marguerite
D'Alvarez
OCTOBER 2009 STUMPER No Winner
Quote
of the Month: "There is hardly one religion in the world which
fails to extol godhead as truth, or beauty. God is truth, we are constantly
reminded. God is truth; God is beauty. Well then, if these properties
of godhead are universally acknowledged, can we not then simply agree
among ourselves there wherever we find truth, then an element of godhead
is present? We need not go so far as to conclude that wherever we find
truth, wisdom and beauty there also exists godhead, no."
Answer: From “The Credo of Being and Nothingness” contained
in Art, Dialogue, and Outrage: Essays on Literature and Culture
by Wole Soyinka.
Brain
Teaser: Who were the first husband and wife to win Oscars for their
acting performances in a motion picture?
Answer: Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier.
SEPTEMBER 2009 STUMPER (Winner: Ed Mallgraf, 9-14-09)
Quote
of the Month: "Most of the day he sat with open eyes, as if
looking into the Valley he had left. It was all so plain now. He had
lied. He phrased it "been fed upon lies," but lies are the
natural food of boyhood, and he had eaten greedily. His first resolve
was to be more careful in the future."
Answer: Maurice
by E. M. Forster
Brain
Teaser: What was special about the horse Olivia de Havilland rode
in the 1938 film, The Adventures of Robin Hood?
Answer: Horse went on to become Roy Rodgers’ horse, Trigger.
AUGUST
2009 STUMPER (Winner:
Ed Mallgraf)
Quote
of the Month: "Perhaps the ten thousand years of our encroaching,
defiant civilization, an eternity to us and a yawn to the rocks around
us, could give way to ten thousand years of humble civilization when
we choose to pay more for the benefits of nature, when we rebuild the
sense of wonder and sanctity that could protect the natural world. At
the end of that span we would still be so young, and perhaps ready to
revel in the timelessness that surrounds us."
Answer: The End of Nature by Bill McKibben.
Brain
Teaser: Name the first Broadway play shown in a television version
with its original cast intact?
Answer:
Rachel Crother's comedy Susan and God, shown on June 7, 1938.
JULY
2009 STUMPER (Winner
on June 30, 2009: Ed Mallgraf)
Quote of the Month: "What is it, to read? They are paper wings
you fly on. They are spaces of mysterious black on white rarefaction.
You travel through air to the last page. You do not actually exist.
You are carried along, a kind of symbol, a useless kind of symbol, integrating
all that is there, predisposed, overdetermined, to some destination
that is both precious and a total nothingness. It is a cunning procedure.
Impersonating and depersonating. And you are lost. And you are found.
And you have been everywhere and nowhere."
Answer: "Eleanor Reads Emma” by Gail Jones in Fetish
Lives
Brain
Teaser: Who was the first child born of English parents in New England?
Answer: Peregrine White, born on board the Mayflower off Cape
Cod on November 20, 1620.
JUNE
2009 STUMPER
No
Winner
Quote of the Month:
"That moon is gone, and they draw near.
They'll go no farther. The river's whisper
And the whispering trunks of trees will drown
Their screams, their lacerated screams.
Here it will be, and soon. I am so tired!"
Answer: From Blood Wedding by Federico Garcia Lorca.
Brain
Teaser: What was the first play produced in America which was performed
1,000 times and who was the star?
Answer: The Gladiator starring Edwin Forrest.
MAY
2009 STUMPER No
Winner
Quote of the Month: "Our mortal enemy is war, war itself.
Let us not argue that we must go to war to defend selfish interests.
They are not worth it. Nor let us argue that we must go to war to defend
our democratic way of life. Such a way of life will not survive. And
let us proclaim a new kind of patriotism, which takes as its object
of ultimate loyalty not the nation-state, but the human race. (Didn't
Margaret Meade say, ‘We have explored the entire planet and found
only one human race?')"
Answer: William Sloane Coffin from Credo.
Brain
Teaser: What was the first movie shown on a television screen?
Answer: The Return of the Scarlet Pimpernel shown in May,
1938.
APRIL
2009 STUMPER (Winner on 4-17-09: Paula Katz)
Quote of the Month: "Understandably, any stage of life more
advanced than one's own is unimaginable. Sometimes one is halfway through
the next stage before one realizes that one has entered it. And then,
earlier stages of advancement offer their compensations. And even so,
the middle is daunting for many people. But the end? It is, interestingly,
the first time of life that you stand entirely outside of while you're
in it."
Answer: The Dying Animal by Philip Roth.
Brain
Teaser: Who was the first African-American opera singer to sing
a white role with a white cast?
Answer: Robert Todd Duncan who first appeared as Tonio in Pagliacci
on Sept. 28, 1945.
MARCH 2009 STUMPER (Winner on 3-9-09: Joanne Razzano)
Quote
of the Month: "If you want to be remembered as a clever person
and even as a benefactor of humanity, don't write a novel, or even talk
about it: instead, compile tables of compound interest, assemble weather
data running back seventy-five years, or develop in tabular form improved
actuarial information. All more useful than anything "creative"
most people could come up with, and less likely to subject the author
to neglect, if not ridicule and contempt. In addition, it will be found
that most people who seek attention and regard by announcing that they're
writing a novel are actually so devoid of narrative talent that they
can't hold the attention of a dinner table for thirty seconds, even
with a dirty joke."
Answer: Bad, or, the Dumbing of America by Paul Fussell.
Brain
Teaser: A monument to this man exists in Westminster Abbey. He lived
under 9 kings of England and was over 150 years old when he died. What
is his name?
Answer: Thomas Parr, known as ·Old Parr,· born
in 1483.
FEBRUARY 2009 STUMPER No Winner
Quote
of the Month: "I drink because it is the only thing that isn't
painful. Being drunk is sad sweet partial. Pieces of me become left
out. All the moving and shaking pieces. They become invisible. And when
they become invisible they also get very powerful and finally take over
like a mindless force which is really the most intelligent part of me.
It knows what I really want."
Answer: Why I Drink by John Patrick Shanley.
Brain Teaser:
He was the only actor in history to receive more than one Oscar nomination
posthumously. Who was this actor?
Answer: James Dean.
JANUARY 2009 STUMPER No Winner
Quote
of the Month: "Twenty years ago no European had ever been here,
and there we were with a band playing, and observing that St Cloup's
Potage a la Julienne was perhaps better than his other soups, and so
on, and all this in the face of those high hills, and we one hundred
and five Europeans being surrounded by at least three thousand Indians,
who looked on at what we call our polite amusements, and bowed to the
ground if a European came near them. I sometimes wonder they do not
cut all our heads off and say nothing more about it."
Answer: Indian Ink by Tom Stoppard.
Brain Teaser: Who
was the first speaker to address an organization via television?
Answer: Dr. Peter Irving Wold, President of the Forthnightly
Club, Schenectady, NY.
Past
Winners
2010
January:
No Winner
February:
No Winner
March:
No
Winner
April: No
Winner
May: No
Winner
June:
July:
August:
September:
October:
November:
December:
2009
January:
No Winner
February:
No Winner
March:
Joanne
Razzano
April: Paula
Katz
May: No Winner
June: No Winner
July:
Ed
Mallgraf
August: Ed
Mallgraf
September: Ed
Mallgraf
October: No
Winner
November: No Winner
December: Ed
Mallgraf
2008
January:
Paula Katz
February: Jo-Ann Benedetti
March:
No Winner
April: No Winner
May: No Winner
June: Judith
Wines
July:
No
Winner
August: No Winner
September: No
Winner
October: Loyce Szalasny
November: No Winner
December: No Winner
2007
January: Jim and Kathy Ault
February: Beverly
Petiet
March: No Winner
April: No Winner
May: No Winner
June: Beverly
Petiet
July: No
Winner
August: No Winner
September: Judith
Wines
October: No Winner
November: No Winner
December: No Winner
2006
January:
No Winner
February: Dennis McHugh
March: Jo-Ann Benedetti
April: No Winner
May: No Winner
June: Jo-Ann
Benedetti
July: Judith Wines
August: No Winner
September: No
Winner
October: No Winner
November: No Winner
December: Beverly Petiet
2005
January: No Winner
February: No Winner
March: No Winner
April: No Winner
May: No Winner
June: No Winner
July: No Winner
August: Krista Simonsen
September: No
Winner
October: Sharon O'Brien
November: No Winner
December: No Winner
2004
January:
No Winner
February: Carolyn Fagan
March: No Winner
April: No Winner
May: Carolyn
Fagan
June: No Winner
July: Gretchen Paris
August: No Winner
September: Christopher Yurasko
October: No Winner
November: Deborah Canzano
December: Carolyn Fagan
2003
January: No Winner
February: No Winner
March: No Winner
April: No Winner
May: Steven Ellemberg
June: Loyce Szalasny
July: No Winner
August:
No Winner
September: Loyce
Szalasny
October:
Steve Geurds
November: No Winner
December:
No Winner