THE SOUTHWORTH PLANETARIUM
207-780-4249      www.usm.maine.edu/planet
70 Falmouth Street     Portland, Maine 04103
43.6667° N                   70.2667° W
Founded January 1970
Julian date:  2457772.16

                "Heavens above!"



THE DAILY ASTRONOMER

Friday, January 20, 2017

Quiz XVIII:   What Happened First?


Yes, the Daily Astronomer lets down its luxuriant tresses on Friday and has
a great deal of fun.   While we focus on astronomy M - Th, our Friday quiz
can pertain to anything and everything.   We've had quizzes about, well,
anything and everything, hence that last sentence.  This week's quiz is
historical.  However, it is not one of those annoying history quizzes that
requires you to precisely know precise dates:  Instead, one would need to
know the proper historical order of events.    Players have to determine
which occurrence predated the other.    For example, "What happened first:  The
battle of Hastings or The landing of the Soviet spacecraft Luna 9 onto the
moon?"



The answer is "The Battle of Hastings," since that fight happened in 1066
and the Luna 9 landing occurred in 1966.   Of course, that one might have
been a bit easy as nine full centuries separated the events.   One will
find as one proceeds through the test that the events might have occurred
with a year or even with days of each other.







So, history buffs, sharpen your quills or pencils and delve deep into the
past!











1.  What happened first:



               a.  Abraham Lincoln was assassinated



               b.  Jules Verne published "Around the World in 80 Days."







2.  What happened first:



               a. The Great London Fire



               b  The Great Chicago Fire







3.  What happened first:



              a.  Alaska became a state



              b.  Hawaii became a state







4.  What happened first:



                 a.  The bombing of Pearl Harbor



                 b. The broadcast of the first television commercial







5.  What happened first:



                   a. The signing of the Magna Carta



                   b. Columbus' first voyage to the Americas







6.  What happened first:



                   a. Cleopatra and Mark Anthony commit suicide after their
defeat at the Battle of Actium



                   b. Roman Emperor Caligula choses his favorite horse,
Incitatus to be a senator.







7.  What happened first:



                    a. Galileo died



                    b. Isaac Newton was born







8.   What happened first:



                   a. Babylonian astronomer Naburiannu determined the
length of the lunar month



                   b. Greek astronomer Eratosthenes measured Earth's
circumference.







9.   What happened first:



                    a.  MTV's first broadcast



                    b.  Ronald Regan's first inauguration.







10.   What happened first:



                   a. The first contingent of British prisoners set sail
for Australia



                   b.  Britain recognized the Independence of the United
States











ANSWERS







1.     Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in 1865;  Jules Verne published
"Around the World in 80 Days" in 1872.







2.    The Great London Fire happened in 1666;  The Chicago conflagration
raged in 1871.







3.   The US granted statehood status to Alaska on January 3, 1959; Hawaii
received the same honor on August 21, 1959.







4. NBC broadcast the first commercial on July 1, 1941;  Pearl Harbor was
bombed on December 7, 1941







5.   The Magna Carta was signed and sealed by King John in 1215;



Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492.







6.  Cleopatra and Mark Anthony went to the next world in 31 BCE; Caligula
named Incantatus to the Senate in 40 AD.   Some historians wonder if the
infamous Emperor actually named this horse to the senate.   If he had done
so, it might have been a symptom of psychosis or merely a gesture of
contempt for the senate.







7. This one is close:   Italian scientist Galileo Galilei died January 8,
1642; English scientist Isaac Newton was born on December 25, 1642







8.  Babylonian astronomer Naburiannu determined the length of the lunar
month in 500 BCE; Eratosthenes calculated Earth's circumference around 260
BCE







9.  Ronald Reagan was sworn in as the 40th president on January 20, 1981
and MTV went on-line (with music, curiously) on August 1, 1981







10.  The first ship carrying convicts and others to Australia set sail in
May 1787;  The Treaty of Paris, which included Britain's recognition of
American Independence and a formal conclusion to the Revolutionary War, was
ratified in September 1783.





RATINGS





10 CORRECT        UBER-HISTORIAN!

                                Candidate for the Beer Prize.   Now, don't
become too excited.  The George Louis Beer Prize is conferred onto a
historian for a notable scholarly achievement in European history since
1895.



7- 9 CORRECT       PREFIX-FREE HISTORIAN

                                 Candidate for the Breasted Prize!   Ok,
before the angry phone calls....the James Henry Breasted Prize is given for
any historical work related to the period  prior to 1000 AD



3 - 6 CORRECT      ASPIRING HISTORIAN

                                 No prizes for wishes, of course; You look
forlornly onto the coterie of the grey-haired and erudite marching in
unison to the library reading room.    You peer up admiringly at the oil on
canvas visage of Edward Gibbon, you draw gratefully on your electronic
cigarette and feel that you are, indeed, reposing in another age.



0 - 2 CORRECT      There was this student one time who failed a history
test so miserably, he not only scored a fat zero on the exam, but the
teacher deemed it necessary to remove points from his most recent Physics
test as a way to make up for the worst point deficit he had ever seen in
his 110 years of mind molding.