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Quiz about Jumbo  This Is Your Life
Quiz about Jumbo  This Is Your Life

Jumbo - This Is Your Life! Trivia Quiz


Ten questions relating to the life of the famous Jumbo the elephant.

A multiple-choice quiz by Creedy. Estimated time: 3 mins.
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Author
Creedy
Time
3 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
383,298
Updated
Sep 20 22
# Qns
10
Difficulty
Easy
Avg Score
8 / 10
Plays
847
Awards
Top 35% Quiz
Last 3 plays: daveguth (8/10), Carouser (8/10), brm50diboll (7/10).
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Question 1 of 10
1. Jumbo was born in which African country? Hint


Question 2 of 10
2. Which organisation put in a bid in 1881 to buy the magnificent Jumbo from the London Zoo? Hint


Question 3 of 10
3. Which London based group wrote 100,000 letters begging Queen Victoria not to sell Jumbo out of the country? Hint


Question 4 of 10
4. So off Jumbo sailed to conquer a new continent. There he was initially exhibited at which venue we may perhaps associate more with boxing matches? Hint


Question 5 of 10
5. When the Brooklyn Bridge was opened in 1883, rumours led to it being considered unsafe. What did Jumbo do to disprove these rumours? Hint


Question 6 of 10
6. How did the gentle Jumbo die in 1885? Hint


Question 7 of 10
7. P.T. Barnum had parts of Jumbo sent to different sites after his death, both as memorials and tourist attractions. The contents of Jumbo's stomach revealed which law-abiding object among its rather odd contents? Hint


Question 8 of 10
8. Which educational event happened to Jumbo's heart after his death? Hint


Question 9 of 10
9. Jumbo's famous hide was stuffed and mounted after his death - and then what? Hint


Question 10 of 10
10. Now we come to the sorrowful and disgraceful ending of Jumbo's life story. His stuffed and mounted figure was destroyed in a fire in 1975 at Tufts University. His ashes remained. Where do they reside today? Hint





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quiz
Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. Jumbo was born in which African country?

Answer: Sudan

Born in 1861 in the Sudan, the baby Jumbo was captured by hunters after they killed his mother. He was then sold to an Italian animal dealer who transported him to Italy. From there he was sold to Germany, and then France, before ending up for a time in the London Zoo.
2. Which organisation put in a bid in 1881 to buy the magnificent Jumbo from the London Zoo?

Answer: Barnum and Bailey Circus

The American-owned Barnum and Bailey Circus offered a staggering ten thousand dollars to buy Jumbo. That's worth over $245,000 in today's money - a jumbo-sized offer you could even say. Poor old Jumbo though had to spent a week in a large crate on that long sea journey to reach his American destination. How frightened and bewildered he must have felt.
3. Which London based group wrote 100,000 letters begging Queen Victoria not to sell Jumbo out of the country?

Answer: School children

That's so cute, and really rather sad. Jumbo was a very popular attraction at the London Zoo, where part of his work there was giving rides to customers, particularly the little ankle biter kind. Alas, poor old Queen Victoria couldn't do much about the sale though. Jumbo was owned by the Zoological Society of London, not by Buckingham Palace.
4. So off Jumbo sailed to conquer a new continent. There he was initially exhibited at which venue we may perhaps associate more with boxing matches?

Answer: Madison Square Garden

Madison Square Garden was originally a passenger depot before P.J. Barnum rented it in 1871. Following suitable renovations, he used it to house his circuses and other shows. It could seat 10,000 spectators by then, and altogether it has had a rather interesting history. After P.J. Barnum had moved on, Madison Square Garden hosted beauty contests, flower shows, music productions, revival and temperance meetings, dog shows, boxing matches - these were not allowed to be called matches at that time and had to be referred to as exhibitions - tennis games, a riding school, velodrome, and an ice carnival and skating rink. That was between 1871 and 1890 alone.

During P.J. Barnum's time there, however, Jumbo took in enough money in the first two WEEKS from curious spectators to pay for his price tag and upkeep. He was a jumbo attraction indeed, the poor old fellow.
5. When the Brooklyn Bridge was opened in 1883, rumours led to it being considered unsafe. What did Jumbo do to disprove these rumours?

Answer: Led a parade of 21 elephants across it

Amazing, isn't it? P.J. Barnum, in spite of his dedication to more or less fleecing the public whenever and wherever he could, had another civic minded side to his nature. Six days after the bridge opened, a rumour went around that it was unsafe. Travelling like wildfire, a large crowd on the bridge heard it at the time and a stampede ensued, in which twelve people were killed. Still considered unsafe twelve months later, P.J. Barnum intervened.

In order to settle the concerns of the public (and earn himself a bit of free publicity along the way) he organised for the giant four metres tall Jumbo to lead a parade of twenty-one pachyderms across the mighty structure to prove that it was indeed as safe as possible.

It worked. Today the Brooklyn Bridge still stands, long after other bridges of its same era have come and gone.
6. How did the gentle Jumbo die in 1885?

Answer: He was hit by a train

The story goes that Tom Thumb, a younger smaller elephant, was standing on the railway tracks when a locomotive was heard approaching. Jumbo saw him there and began walking towards his young colleague, intending, it is thought, to lead him to safety. However, he didn't make it in time, and the train did indeed hit Tom Thumb, killing him instantly.

The force of that blow derailed the train and it flipped towards our darling old Jumbo, also killing him instantly. That was P.J. Barnum's version. The media however reported that as Jumbo headed towards Tom Thumb, the train hit him instead, killing him instantly, and breaking Tom Thumb's leg. Either way, it's a sad ending for a gentle creature that never harmed a soul in its life.
7. P.T. Barnum had parts of Jumbo sent to different sites after his death, both as memorials and tourist attractions. The contents of Jumbo's stomach revealed which law-abiding object among its rather odd contents?

Answer: A police whistle

There is no truth to the rumour that this caused Jumbo to whistle instead of trumpeting. Among the contents found in his stomach, following his tragic death, were pennies (mementos of his life in England), rivets (mementos of his heroic charge across the Brooklyn Bridge) and a police whistle. How Jumbo came to consume that is anybody's guess - there is no history of a jail break or a traffic offence - but altogether those little objects are all rather sad.

It's as though Jumbo had no other way to hold onto his memories, except to swallow them. Thank goodness he never took a shine to the Statue of Liberty.
8. Which educational event happened to Jumbo's heart after his death?

Answer: Barnum sold it to Cornell University

Jumbo was a larger than normal elephant, and was billed on advertising posters accordingly wherever he toured, so perhaps his heart matched his size. Either way, and at the request of Burt Green Wilder, who was a professor of anatomy, neurology, and zoology at the Cornell university, Jumbo's heart was sold to that organisation for forty dollars - one thousand dollars in 2016 value.

His skeleton was given, free of charge, to the American Museum of Natural History, and other parts went elsewhere.
9. Jumbo's famous hide was stuffed and mounted after his death - and then what?

Answer: Taken on tour with the circus for two years

Lord bless us, P.J. Barnum certainly got his money's worth out of Jumbo. He loved him though, so let's not be too harsh on him. In either case, one suspects Jumbo would have enjoyed keeping on touring. He was, after all, not just a pretty face, but a bona fide working pachyderm.

After those two years had passed though, P.J. Barnum donated our stuffed and mounted Jumbo to Tufts University, and it was displayed there until April 1975. Today that university still has Jumbo as its mascot, with many representations of this larger than life hero displayed around its grounds and buildings.
10. Now we come to the sorrowful and disgraceful ending of Jumbo's life story. His stuffed and mounted figure was destroyed in a fire in 1975 at Tufts University. His ashes remained. Where do they reside today?

Answer: In a peanut butter jar

Isn't that disgraceful? That mighty and gallant giant of the entertainment world is going to spend the rest of the foreseeable future in the office of the Tufts Sports director - in a Peter Pan Crunchy Peanut Butter jar. It could have been Vegemite at the very least.
Source: Author Creedy

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