The Color's the Thing Trivia Quiz

Answer: Black in the title

"Black Beauty" is the title of an 1877 novel by English author Anna Sewell. Told in first person narrative style by the title character, a horse named Black Beauty, the novel recounts the horse's early life on a farm, his time pulling a cab in London, and his eventual retirement in the country. A major theme of the novel is the treatment of animals at the time.

Answer: Blue in the title

The Blue Angels are the United States Navy's Flight Demonstration Squadron. Formed in 1946, the squadron started operating the Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet in 2020. They perform some 60 shows per year in the United States and Canada.

Answer: Red in the title

A "Red Herring" is a literary device that is used to lead the reader to a false conclusion, either purposefully or sometimes inadvertently. The term was coined in 1807 by English writer William Cobbett.

Answer: Yellow in the title

The song "Mellow Yellow" was released in 1966 by Scottish singer Donovan. Included on the album of the same name, the song reached the number 2 spot on the Billboard chart in the USA in 1967, and the number 8 spot in the U.K.

Answer: Black in the title

The "Black Death" was the name given to the outbreak of bubonic and pneumonic plague that ravaged Europe and North Africa in the mid 14th Century. Beginning in 1346 and lasting until 1353, the plague was spread by fleas that lived on rats, which were endemic to human settlements and food supplies.

It is estimated that the plague killed off up to 60 percent of the population, perhaps as many as 200 million people.

Answer: Blue in the title

The blue whale is a marine mammal and the largest creature to ever inhabit the Earth. Up to 100 feet long and weighing up to 220 tons, blue whales are found in every ocean. The whales were hunted almost to extinction in several areas until hunting was banned in 1966. They still remain a threatened species though in the 21st century.

Answer: Red in the title

The original use of a "red flag" was a literal red flag, used as a warning of danger. For example, a ship carrying munitions, military exercises using live ammunition, increased risk of wildfires, and warnings of unsafe swimming conditions at beaches all used red flags. The term has also come to mean any kind of warning sign in modern parlance.

Answer: Yellow in the title

Yellow fever is a viral, mosquito-borne disease that originated in tropical Africa and was spread to Europe and the Americas via the African slave trade. The disease gets its name by the yellowing of the patient's skin if the disease spreads to the liver. Deadly outbreaks of yellow fever were common in Europe, Africa, and the Americas until the early 20th Century, when effective treatments were developed. Yellow fever is still active in tropical areas of Africa.

Answer: Black in the title

The Black Mamba is a venomous African snake that can grow over 10 feet long. Native to sub-Saharan Africa, the black mamba is the second most venomous snake in the world, after the king cobra. The name of the snake comes from the coloring of the inside of the mouth, not the skin, which runs from gray to dark brown.

Answer: Black in the title

A black hole is the region of spacetime where the gravitational pull is so strong that nothing, not even light, can escape it. While the concept of an object with a gravitational field strong enough that light could not escape was first considered as long ago as the 18th century, the term was first defined by American physicist David Finkelstein in 1958.

The first black hole positively identified as such was found in the constellation of Cygnus in 1971, and designated Cygnus X-1. It is postulated that a black hole lies at the center of the Milky Way galaxy.

A black hole is formed by the collapse of a large star.

Answer: Blue in the title

The term "True Blue" has been in use since the 1600s in Europe and America. Meaning honest, trustworthy, and steadfast, the term originates in the European concept of the color blue standing for these positive qualities.

Answer: Blue in the title

The term "Blue Movie" is an American slang term from the 1960s which refers to sexually explicit content. The term comes from the blue tint of the prints of early pornographic films, which were caused by the technological limitations of the editing and print processing. The term went out of general use in the 1980s, as sexually explicit films became more mainstream.

Answer: Red in the title

The Red Army was the ground force of the former Soviet Union. Established in 1918 during the Russian Revolution, it was renamed the Soviet Army after World War II. The term "Red Army" was still used in reference to the force until the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.

Answer: Red in the title

The term "Seeing Red", meaning to become very angry or to lose one's temper, is thought to be an allusion to the European concept of the color red being the shade of passion and anger. It could also mean the flushing of the skin to a reddish color when a person is angered or aroused, or, perhaps the term is akin to waving a red cape to anger a bull in the Spanish sport of bullfighting. Linguists are not in agreement on how long the term has been in use.

Answer: Yellow in the title

The term "Yellow Streak" refers to being a coward or being afraid. The usual term is "yellow streak down the back". The term originated in Europe as yellow was considered the color of cowardice.

Answer: Yellow in the title

The term "Yellow Peril" is a racist metaphor that describes the threat posed by the Asiatic, or "yellow" people, to the more advanced, "white", and "civilized" nations of Western culture. The term was coined by Russian sociologist Jacques Novikow in an 1897 essay.

The connotation is that the Asiatic cultures of China, Japan, and others, with their high birth rates and "devious" nature, would eventually overrun and destroy the Western world if not dealt with. Though the term is recognized now as being racist, the concept has been used to frighten people in Europe and America and justify war and repression of Asiatic people into the 21st century.