In Order To Be An Explorer Trivia Quiz

Leif Ericson (or Erikson) was born in Iceland. His father was Eric the Red. Leif set off at twenty-one to explore other lands and accidentally landed in North America when his ship was blown off course. He spent the winter cutting timber so in the spring he could sail back to Greenland with the timber.
Leif died in 1020 while living in Greenland.

Marco Polo was born in Venice, Italy. Because Marco's father was a traveling merchant, Marco didn't meet his father until he was a teenager. When Marco was old enough he went with his father on his travels. They used the Silk Road to China because the ships were too old to try to sail. Marco kept a journal of his travels with his father.

When Marco contracted tuberculosis, he and his father stopped in a country now known as Afghanistan so Marco could recover. It took three years to get to China. Kubla Khan showered them with gifts and took them to exotic China cities. After fourteen years in China with Kubla Khan, both Marco and his father wanted to return to Italy. The only way Kubla Khan would let them leave is by escorting Kokachin, the Blue Princess, to her wedding in Iran.

Three years later, Marco and his father delivered the Blue Princess to Iran. Marco returned home but became bored and left again. During a war between Genoa and Venice, Marco was captured and held by the Genoese government. While in captivity he used his journals to write the book "The Travels of Marco Polo". After being released from prison, Marco married and had three daughters and never travelled outside of Venice again. In 1324, Marco died at age seventy while living in Venice.

Ibn Battuta was born in Tangier, Morocco. Ibn was a judge in Morocco when he set out at the age of twenty-one to travel to Mecca and instead of going back home he continued traveling. He didn't like boats so he set out on foot staying at monasteries along the way and accepting food and clean clothing from locals.

On his exploration to China, he discovered a country he hated and spent as little time in the country as possible. During his travels, Ibn married ten times and fathered five children. Six of his ten marriages took place while he was staying in the Maldives. After thirty years of traveling, Ibn settled back into Morocco where he recorded his travels for posterity. He died in 1368 while living in Tangier, Morocco. A mall in Dubai shares Ibn's name.

Zheng He was born in Yunnan Fu Province, China. Zheng had lived in the palace of Emperor Yongle since he was ten years old and was captured by generals from China's Ming Dynasty. He became a director of the palace servants and an officer in the army.

When Zheng was thirty-five he was given the job of sailing to Asia, Africa, India, and Arabia to deliver gifts and gather information. He was given sixty ships. Zheng took the ships out seven times to deliver the gifts and bring back treasures. In all his years commanding ships, Zheng and his crew only resorted to violence three times. He died in 1433 in his large house built close to a mosque in Calicut (aka Kozhikode), India. After his death at sixty-two, all of his riches went to his nephew.

Christopher Columbus was born in Genoa, Italy. He claimed that he travelled on the sea since he was ten years old. He claimed that he survived a shipwreck by floating on an oar and then swimming six miles to the shore on Portugal. Christopher was also considered by many people to be boastful.

On his travels, he took his two sons and his worn out copy of "The Travels of Marco Polo". He asked King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella if he could be known as the Admiral of the Sea and wanted one-tenth of all the treasure he brought home. Queen Isabella let him have three ships with thirty men each to go out and look for new land. Five weeks later, he landed with his men landed at San Salvador. He claimed the island for Spain and made the locals his slaves that he referred to as Indians (he erroneously believed he was in the West Indies).

He was shown how to get to Haiti and Cuba which he quickly claimed for Spain. When he returned to Spain, he did so with gold, fruits, exotic animals, fish, birds, and slaves. Over time, Christopher became cruel and doled out inhumane punishments. When his cruelty got back to the king and queen of Spain, they had him arrested and thrown in prison. Upon his release from prison, he began wearing monk's robes. He died in 1506 in Vallodolid, Spain. Ironically, the gold her brought back to Spain was found to be iron pyrite (fool's gold).

Ferdinand Magellan was born in Sabrosa, Portugal. He worked as a page in the Portugal court at the age of twelve. He wanted to sail, but couldn't come up with the money to fund a trip to see if there was a passage through South America. When the king wouldn't or couldn't help him he switched loyalties from Portugal to Spain.

At the age of thirty-seven, Spain took a chance on Ferdinand and gave him five ships. He took his son Cristoavo and a slave with him on his travels. A scholar also accompanied the men to journal the travels. Ferdinand turned out to be a cruel master, killing several of his men or having his man kill other men. He was insistent on finding a passage through South America and in 1520 he did just that by finding a 325 mile strip of waterway, at the southern tip of South America, that would let him sail through. Thirty-eight days later, Ferdinand and his men completed the sail through South America. He named the new water Pacifico (Pacific).

In 1521, Ferdinand and three of his five ships landed in Mactan, Philippines. He wanted the natives of Mactan to be baptized in the Christian faith. The natives attacked Ferdinand and his men as a way of rejecting his idea of them being baptized. While running back to his ship, Ferdinand was killed by a poisonous arrow. Only one of the five ships Ferdinand started out with returned to Spain with eighteen of the original crew members on board. Ten years after his death, the waterway he explored through South America was named the Strait of Magellan.

Henry Hudson, born in London, England, would take his oldest son with him when traveling; leaving his wife and other children behind. He began charting courses along the coast of what is now New York. While out exploring James Bay for a route to Asia, Henry Hudson and his men had to outwinter (live in the ship until spring thaw) for the first time. With the spring came the thaw and a mutiny.

Henry, his son, and any ill sailors were set adrift on a boat. He was presumed dead at the age of forty-five in the Hudson Bay.

James Cook was born in Marton, Yorkshire England. He was commander of a ship that explored Tahiti, New Zealand and Australia. He married and had six children. He was a non-practicing Quaker. Eleven of his men were eaten by cannibals while out foraging. He used a chronometer to measure longitude while he and his men explored Europe.

In 1779, James and his men discovered Hawai'i. Something happened to him while he was in Hawai'i -- his men noticed a change in his demeanor from pleasant to violent. If one of his men or one of the natives disobeyed him, James had their ear cut off or he burnt their homes. While staying in Kealakekua, Hawai'i, he unsuccessfully tried to take the king of Hawai'i hostage. He and his men were attacked by the natives. He died at fifty, stabbed to death
Little did he know that he had prevented scurvy among his men by making them eat fresh fruits and vegetables while on ship.

Daniel Boone was born in Berks County, Pennsylvania. He liked to travel alone while out hunting and using the skills he was shown by the local Indian tribes and various family members. Because of his knowledge of geography, he was hired to form a trail through the Cumberland Gap for a new state that would become known as Kentucky. He loved the idea and began clearing the area and exploring what would be his new home.

He created Wilderness Road which was a route to the west. He built the first town and named it Boonesborough where he and his family settled. The Cherokee tribe gave him the nickname Wide Mouth because of his quick turn to laugh. His respect for the Indians didn't wane when he was shot, his son killed, and his daughter kidnapped (he rescued her two days later). A band of Shawnee Indians gave him the nickname Big Turtle. He was able to help defend Boonesborough from the Shawnee when they attacked. He died in 1820 at the age of 85 in St. Charles, Missouri.

Sacajawea was a Shoshone Indian born in either Idaho or Montana. She joined Meriweather Lewis and William Clarke in their exploration of the area bought in the Louisiana Purchase. Sacajawea was at the time a married fifteen year old with a child. She spoke several languages, which was one of the reasons Lewis and Clark wanted her help. She not only helped interpret for the group, but she also knew what plants and roots to eat when food became scarce.

While the group crossed the Rocky Mountains, Sacajawea came across her brother who she hadn't seen since she was a child. The reunion helped the group cross the mountains safely. Lewis and Clark referred to Sacajawea's son as "Pomp" and "It", respectively. It took a year for Sacajawea and her group to reach the Pacific Ocean. The only thing Sacajawea wanted to do when they reached the ocean was see a beached whale. Sacajawea died at Fort Manuel, North Dakota in 1812.
In January 2001, Sacajawea was made an Honorary Sergeant in the Republican Army by President Clinton. Her face appears on a coin known as the Sacajawea dollar. It began circulating in 2002 with 71 billion coins being made.

Richard was born in Torquay, United Kingdom and learned over forty languages. He was expelled from Oxford after, ironically, trying to get kicked out. He joined the army in Pakistan and went undercover as a Muslim merchant. He was the first European to explore Africa.

At the age of forty, Richard married Isabel Arundell. When he retired to Italy, Richard translated "The Thousand and One Nights" into English. When he died at age sixty-nine in Trieste, Italy his wife burned the majority of his journals due to his machinations.

Isabella Bird was born in North Yorkshire, England. She was the daughter of a preacher and a Sunday School teacher. She suffered from chronic pain so her father would send her to visit family in the USA to see if the boat trip would help ease her pain. She found the movement of the boat helped her pain so after leaving her family in America, she continued traveling by boat.

After leaving America, Isabelle travelled to Australia, but disliked the continent so she headed to Hawai'i which she loved. She loved the new state of Colorado and while there fell in love with a man named Rocky Mountain Jim. However, the man didn't feel the same way about Isabella and nothing ever came of their relationship. Isabella wrote letters of her travels to her sister and turned ten of those letters into books. While in the Middle East, Isabella helped map out the countries of Turkey and Iran. She married John Bishop, her sister's doctor, in 1881 and was widowed five years later. Isabella travelled more after her husband died. She explored India, China, Japan, and Korea.

When the Royal Geographic Society extended her an invitation to speak about her explorations, she turned them down because there were no women in the Society. Only when the RGS made Isabella a fellow in 1892 and invited fifteen women to join, did Isabella speak to the group. Isabella became the first woman to speak at the Royal Geographic Society. Isabella Bird died at the age of seventy-twoin Edinburgh, Scotland.

Mary Kingsley was born in London, England. While taking care of her invalid mother, she dreamed of going to Africa so, after both her parents passed away, she travelled to South Africa. The locals tried different ways to scare her away, but it only made her want to stay longer. She passed herself off as a local so she could trade some of her goods to make money. She pretended to have a husband so bachelors would leave her alone.

The more time she spent in Africa, the more she despised American missionaries who criticized Africans and their culture. While nursing sick African prisoners in 1900, she contracted typhoid. She passed away at the age of thirty-seven in Cape Town, South Africa.

Matthew Henson was born in Nanjemoy, Maryland. He was a store clerk when he met explorer Robert Peary, who hired him as his personal assistant to accompany him on a trip to explore Nicaraugua and the Arctic. He was the only man on Peary's team to learn the Inuit language and because of that the Inuit gave the nickname of "Matthew, the kind one".

During their trip to the Arctic, Robert Peary's toes fell off due to frostbite which made Henson even more indispensable to Peary. When they were close to the North Pole, Peary sent Henson ahead of the group. When Henson planted the American flag on the North Pole, he knew there were no other places for he and Peary to explore. After the expedition, Henson never spoke to Peary again. Along with the others on the expedition, he received the Congressional Medal of Honor. He became the first black member of the Explorers Club. In 1955, he died at the age of eighty-eight while living in New York City, New York.

Picard, born in Basil, Switzerland, was a professor of physics who wanted to study particles in the stratosphere. He invented the "aero-helmet" which was basically a basket that was put over a person's head in a crash and could also double as a container. He went nine miles above the Earth in 1931 in his stratospheric balloon. When he wasn't exploring the sky or teaching physics, he lived in the Swiss Alps with his wife Marianne and their five children.

After going to space, he wanted to know how deep in the ocean he could go. With financial help from the king and queen of Belgium, he created an object that would help him go deep down into the ocean and called it the bathyscaphe. In 1953, he used their bathyscaphe called Trieste deep into the ocean. It was the last time he would explore the ocean because of his age.

He died in 1962 of heart failure at the age of 78 in Lausanne, Switzerland. He was the inspiration for the character Jean-Luc Picard in "Star Trek: The Next Generation" and for Professor Cuthburt in "The Adventures of TinTin". His travels nine miles above the Earth inspired the pressurized cabins that are used in airplanes to this day.

Richard Byrd was born in Winchester, Virginia. He wanted to be the first person to fly over the North Pole, but Roald Amundsen beat him to it so Richard became the first person to fly over the South Pole. His feat led to him having three ticker tape parades when he returned home.

At the age of forty-five, Richard spent five months in a house under the ice in Antarctica. He took with him music, cards, and "The Travels of Marco Polo". After five months living in a house under the ice, Richard suffered from frostbite and carbon monoxide poisoning. During another one of his trips to Antarctica, he named a piece of land Marie Byrd Land, after his wife.

Richard died at the age of sixty-eight while living in Boston, Massachusetts.

Sally Ride, born in Los Angeles, California, majored in physics and English in college. When NASA was looking for scientists to study robots in space, she applied along with eight thousand others. She was one of the 35 chosen in 1979. She got her astrophysics doctorate and her astronaut training the same year. At the time, Sally was one of six female astronauts in NASA.

In 1983, she became the first American woman and the youngest woman to go to space. While there, she helped build a robot to retrieve satellites and perform experiments. She spent 343 three hours in space. After the Challenger exploded in 1986 and space flight came to a halt, she joined the investigative team looking into the reasons for the crash. She wrote seven books on science and space aimed at children. In 2012, Sally died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 61 in La Jolla, California.