You May Say I'm a Schemer Trivia Quiz

Answer: His Gunpowder Plot successfully blew up the House of Lords

Today in Great Britain, people continue to celebrate Guy Fawkes Day/Night or Bonfire Night on November 5 to commemorate the failure of the 1605 Gunpowder Plot. Bonfire Night usually involves festivities such as fireworks while an effigy of the conspirator Guy Fawkes is placed on the fire to burn away. Guy Fawkes (1570-1606) was among the Catholic conspirators of the Gunpowder Plot which sought to blow up the House of Parliament.

These conspirators were enraged that Protestant King James I refused to grant more religious tolerance to Catholics.

The plan failed since the conspirators were betrayed. Guy Fawkes and the other conspirators were tried and executed. In the aftermath, Parliament declared November 5 to be a national day of thanksgiving, leading to the first Guy Fawkes Day celebration in 1606. Having a Catholic stepfather, Guy Fawkes converted to Catholicism and later fought for Catholic Spain against the Dutch Republic during the Eighty Years War. Today, Guy Fawkes's name and image are associated with anarchism/disobedience against government power.

Answer: John Wilkes Booth

American actor and supporter of the Confederacy, John Wilkes Booth (1838-1865), assassinated President Abraham Lincoln on Good Friday of 1865, around the same time as the aftermath of the American Civil War. Booth was hellbent on committing the assassination and was even in attendance at Lincoln's inauguration for a second term, which took place only 41 days before the assassination. Lincoln's assassination took place at Ford's Theater in Washington D.C. during a play. Booth shouted "sic semper tyrannis" upon fatally shooting the president. "Sic semper tyrannis" is a Latin phrase meaning "thus always to tyrants." The line is sometimes said to have been said by Brutus after he assassinated Julius Caesar, but there are no findings of ancient sources to back this up, making the phrase more of a modern invention. "Sic semper tyrannis" was also adopted as Virginia's state motto since 1776 (as shown on the Virginia state flag).

Answer: He ran for president while in prison

Eugene V. Debs (1855-1926) was a former member of the Indiana State Senate and one of the founders of the Industrial Workers of the World. Debs is known for having been a presidential candidate an astounding five times, running as a member of the Socialist Party of America.

In 1920, Debs ran for president in the 1920 election while imprisoned in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary. At this time, he was serving a 10-year sentence for his speech protesting America's involvement in World War One. Debs, like other socialists and conscientious objectors at the time, believed that the war was being waged by the elite for profit and at the expense of the world's workers.

Although pushed to the margins and deemed too radical in his day, Debs is still widely regarded as being a founding figure of socialist political activism in America, as well as a figurehead for trade unions.

Answer: The Black Hand

Gavrilo Princip (1894-1918) was a Bosnian Serb who infamously assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg in June of 1914 during the monarchs' official visit to Sarajevo, Bosnia. Princip was trained in terrorism by the Serbian secret society known as the Black Hand.

The secret society is also called Ujedinjenje ili Smrt, "Union or Death." Princip wanted to destroy Austro-Hungarian rule in the Balkans and unite the South Slav peoples into a federal nation.

The assassination of the Austro-Hungarian monarchs gave Austria-Hungary the excuse that it had sought to open hostilities against Serbia. This thus precipitated World War I which would engulf the rest of Europe until 1918.

Answer: Ethel Rosenberg

During the Cold War, Ethel Rosenberg and her husband Julius Rosenberg were charged with conspiracy to commit espionage. The American couple was found guilty of providing the Soviet Union with top-secret information about American radar, sonar, and valuable nuclear weapon design. In 1953, the couple was executed by the electric chair.

Answer: Francisco Franco

Spanish dictator Francisco Franco (1892-1975) assumed the title "El Caudillo" (The Leader) and ruled over Spain from 1939 until his death in 1975. Francisco Franco led the Nationalist forces in overthrowing Spain's Republic during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). Mirroring other dictators during this era, Francisco Franco led a coup against the republican government amid political divisions, in order to assert his own nationalist and conservative vision for Spain. During the Spanish Civil War, Francisco Franco also forbade the Basque language and took away the rights of the Basques, deepening the conflict between Basque Country and Spain, a conflict that would go on for the next decades.

Answer: The Catcher in the Rye

Mark David Chapman (b. 1955) was the infamous murderer of musician and former Beatles member John Lennon. Chapman fatally shot John Lennon in New York City on December 8 of 1980. Born in Fort Worth, Texas, Chapman spent time in the U.S. Air Force. During his life, he developed an obsession with J.D. Salinger's novel, "The Catcher in the Rye" (1951), admiring the protagonist Holden Caulfield to an extreme extent. Chapman also struggled heavily with depression and alcohol.

In addition to being fixated on Salinger's novel, Chapman enjoyed John Lennon's music. According to Chapman's wife, Chapman viewed Lennon as hypocritical for preaching about equality and simplicity in his song "Imagine" (1971), while still being an affluent celebrity.

When police found Chapman right after the assassination, they found him casually flipping through his copy of "Catcher in the Rye."

Answer: Miguel Hidalgo

Miguel Hidalgo is not a figure of the Mexican Revolution of 1910-1920. Rather, Miguel Hidalgo (1753-1811) is a primary figure of the Mexican War of Independence (1810-1821). Hidalgo is also recognized as Mexico's national founder. Catholic priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla famously issued a call for a revolution on September 16, 1810 in an event known as "El Grito de Dolores". On that particular day, Hidalgo rang his church's bell and gave the call to arms that triggered the Mexican War of Independence.

In the end, Mexico won against Spain in the fight for independence. Later in Mexico's history, the Mexican Revolution of 1910-1920 was a series of armed regional conflicts when Mexican liberals challenged the regime of dictator Porfirio Díaz. "Pancho" Villa and Emiliano Zapata are regarded as famous figures in this Mexican Revolution.

Answer: anarchism

Emma Goldman (1869-1940), was a Russian-born political activist and writer, known for her anarchist views. Born in Kovno, Lithuania (then within the Russian Empire), Emma Goldman later moved to New York where she became infamous for her activism. Before moving to America, Goldman lived a difficult life, aggravated by harsh labor conditions, an unhappy arranged marriage, and the strict oppression of her Orthodox Jewish family. Emma Goldman championed the causes of anarchism, socialism, labor reform, and women's liberation.

She was inspired by the 1886 Chicago Haymarket affair involving the executions of anarchist protestors. As a gifted writer and activist, Emma Goldman was seen as a threatening force of radicalism during her time, especially amid President William McKinley's 1901 assassination at the hands of the anarchist Leon Czolgosz. Like the socialist leader Eugene V. Debs, Emma Goldman spoke out against America's involvement in World War I, a war that Goldman and others deemed unjust.

As a result, she was arrested in 1917 on charges of conspiring against the Selective Service Act or draft. After her release, she was arrested again along with hundreds of other radicals during the Red Scare. She was then deported back to Russia where she initially supported the Bolshevik Revolution until becoming disillusioned by their violence. She later lived in Western Europe before finally settling in Canada.

Answer: Adolf Hitler was arrested after his involvement

The Beer Hall Putsch, also known as the Munich Putsch, was a failed coup d'état by Nazi party leader Adolf Hitler, only lasting from November 8 to November 9 of 1923. The location was in Munich of the Weimar Republic during a time of great financial crisis, unease, and division between various political groups. Hitler had led the Nazi Party since 1921.

The Beer Hall Putsch in 1923 was a plan by Hitler and other Nazi Party members to take over the government in Bavaria, a state in southern Germany.

However, after the plan failed, Hitler was imprisoned, leading him to write his manifesto during his time in prison.