Friends Just Can't be Found Trivia Quiz

Answer: Clara Barton

Born in Massachusetts in 1821, Clara Barton taught herself nursing as there were no nursing schools in the USA at the time. When the American Civil War started she sought and distributed medical supplies, sometimes working in battlefield hospitals herself.

After the war she operated a government agency to reunite soldiers with their families and provide information about the missing. When a doctor ordered her to take a vacation she went to Switzerland where she learned about the Red Cross and worked with it while she was there. Returning to America she badgered three U.S. presidents to let her open an American branch, which she finally did in 1881.

Answer: Thomas Edison

Edison invented an affordable light bulb, motion picture camera and phonograph among the 1,093 things he patented in the United States. The light bulb had been invented in 1840 by British scientist Warren de la Rue but it used a platinum filament, pricing it out of reach of most people. Edison received a patent for using carbonized bamboo as the element.

As the world learned the uses and problems of electrical current a war of sorts emerged between Edison and those who favored direct current flow and those in favor of alternating current.

It was one of the few challenges Edison could not overcome as alternating current became the standard in the USA.

Answer: Sacagawea

Captain Meriwether Lewis and Second Lieutenant William Clark, along with a small group of army soldiers to be called the Corps of Discovery were commissioned in 1803 by President Thomas Jefferson to explore a huge swath of land purchased from France and known as the Louisiana Purchase. The land reached from the Mississippi River to what would become Montana and Wyoming. Upon reaching the area that would become North Dakota they knew they needed an interpreter for the Indian tribes they would meet. Lewis and Clark hired Toussaint Charbonneau, a French-Canadian trapper who brought along his pregnant wife, Sacagawea, a Lemhi Shoshone woman.

Sacagawea not only knew many of the language variations of the Indian bands they met along the way and the routes they might take but she happened to be the sister of the chief of a band of Shoshones in Idaho. During the two-year expedition she guided the white men, used native medicines to heal them and found food for them when supplies ran low. The public relations value was important too; when meeting the various tribes with an Indian woman and her child, as Lewis noted in his diary, she "confirmed those people of our friendly intentions, as no woman ever accompanies a war party of Indians in this quarter".

Answer: Nadia Comaneci

In preparation for the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Canada, the official timekeeper, Omega SA, asked the International Olympic Committee if their displays should be capable of showing 10, a perfect score. No, said the IOC - won't happen. So a Romanian girl named Nadia Comaneci scored a perfect 10 on the uneven bars.

The scoreboards could only show a score of "1.00" because of the display limitations. She went on to score six more 10s during the games and won the Olympic all-around title, the youngest to do so, at age 14. Since then the age for gymnastic competition has been raised to 16 so unless it is lowered Comaneci will be the permanent record holder.

Answer: Harland Sanders

Harland Sanders was born in 1890 to a family with little money to spare. His father died when Sanders was five and he learned to cook when his mother was away working. He worked various jobs, often getting fired for insubordination or fighting. In 1930, the Shell Oil Company offered him the use of a service station, lease-free, in Corbin, Kentucky, if he would give the company a percentage of the sales. Besides selling gasoline, Sanders opened a small restaurant in part of the building.

His cooking became popular, particularly his fried chicken (flavored by his "secret recipe of 11 herbs and spices"). In 1935 he was made a "Kentucky Colonel", an honorary title bestowed by the Commonwealth of Kentucky. In 1952, "Colonel" Sanders, started franchising his business; the first franchised restaurant opened in Utah. By 1964, Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants were in over 600 locations. Sanders, age 73 by then, couldn't keep up with his business so he sold it but remained as brand ambassador until his death in 1980. His image, including his white suit, is still used by the company, now rebranded to KFC.

Answer: Joan of Arc

From 1337 to 1453 (including some peace treaties) France and England engaged in the Hundred Years' War. In 1428, a 17-year old woman named Joan asked to see Charles VII, the disputed king of France. She told him she had divine visions and knew how to keep the English from conquering France. He believed her and sent her with a relief army to a siege going on in Orleans. In nine days the siege was lifted and the English retreated. She urged the army on and the English were pushed further back. The town of Reims, the traditional site of French coronations, was liberated and Charles was coronated there.

Joan participated in more battles but without victory. She was captured and turned over to the English. Charged and convicted of heresy she was burned at the stake in 1431. In 1456 the trial was declared invalid and Joan's innocence reaffirmed. Over time she was venerated as a martyr. In 1920 she was canonized a saint by the Roman Catholic Church and in 1922 was named a patron saint of France.

Answer: Mary Shelley

Mary Shelley was an author and editor but her claim to fame is that she is credited with writing one of the first science fiction novels. She was romantically involved with the English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley and would marry him at the end of 1816.

They spent the summer of 1816 in Switzerland with Lord Byron. As a writing exercise Byron suggested they each write a ghost story. After many weeks an idea came to Mary in a waking dream about a corpse that was reanimated by using electricity.

The idea evolved into the novel "Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus". Two-hundred years later it still inspires movies and books.

Answer: Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin is noted for his book "On the Origin of Species" but he was originally as much a geologist as a biologist. From an early age he had an interest in all things scientific. After studying at Christ's College at the University of Cambridge from 1828 to 1831 he was encouraged to join a (self-funded) two-year voyage to study geology and nature around the world on the HMS Beagle. Darwin's father was a wealthy doctor who was talked into supplying funds and Darwin joined the voyage, which turned out to last for five years. During the voyage he made several discoveries and made note of anomalies both geological and biological.

The idea of evolutionary biology was gaining popularity in Europe at the time, including writings by Darwin's grandfather, Erasmus Darwin. While having responsibilities of writing many scientific papers and journals Darwin worked on his theory of evolution from a common ancestor, finally publishing "On the Origin of Species" in 1858. The book was both hailed and vilified. Natural scientists found much agreement with it and much of organized religion condemned it. While his idea of natural selection is now accepted science it still has its doubters.

Answer: Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks has become an icon in the civil rights movement in the United States. On December 1, 1955, she was riding on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, in the "colored" section in the back. The "White" section in the front was full and the driver ordered her to leave the bus so a white passenger could have her seat. She refused and was arrested for violating Alabama's segregation laws.

She was not the first Black person to defy bus segregation but the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), wanting to bring a court case to overturn the laws, decided hers was the case with the best chance of success. A federal lawsuit ensued and in November, 1956, it was ruled that bus segregation laws were unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Parks' actions and the resulting boycott of the Montgomery bus system by Black people became hallmarks of the civil rights movement.

Answer: Joseph Lister

Joseph Lister was a British surgeon of perhaps average ability but his interest in controlling or preventing post-operative infection made him the foremost proponent of antiseptic surgery. He came from a prosperous Quaker family and his father encouraged him to become a medical researcher. In 1843 Lister enrolled in University College London Medical School, one of the few colleges or universities in Great Britain that would accept Quakers. As part of clinical instruction Lister noted how infections spread through surgical wards and it became a substantial concern of his. Much of his work involved using carbolic acid to kill bacteria. This led to its general use in sterilizing hands, surgical instruments and the operating room itself.

The mouthwash Listerine, created in America in 1879, was named after him though he was not involved in the company.