Draggin' My Dragon on Down Trivia Quiz

Answer: Yosemite Sam

Sent on a quest that all the court knights had considered too dangerous for anyone but a fool, Bugs snuck in past the knight and dragon, and gathered in the sword, which promptly began to vibrate musically. Furious chasing ensued, culminating with Sam and Gerry locked in a room full of explosives. When Gerry sneezed, the flames ignited the explosives, and the castle took off in the general direction of the moon.

Mel Blanc provided all the voices for this cartoon, which became the first (and only, during the 20th century) Bugs Bunny cartoon to win an Academy Award - it won Best Animated Short Film in 1959.

Gerry subsequently appeared, briefly, in several other Warner Brothers cartoons, and is a character in the video game 'Sheep, Dog 'n' Wolf', titled 'Sheep Raider' for North American release on Playstation.

Answer: Kenneth Grahame

While 'The Wind in the Willows' is undoubtedly Graham's best known work, 'The Reluctant Dragon', originally published as part of the collection 'Dream Days', is the short story that is familiar to more readers than his others. It tells the story of a young boy who finds a dragon that would prefer to read and write poetry than bother people, but who is nevertheless considered a danger by the people of the town. St George is called on to fight their dragon, but he comes to realise that there is no threat, so agrees to put on a 'show battle' in which he carefully stabs the dragon so as to produce a superficial wound. He then assures the townspeople that the dragon is now a reformed character, and can be allowed to live in peace.

This story was the basis for the Disney's 1941 film of the same name. It has also been turned into an operetta (music by John Rutter, lyrics by David Grant), and has been a segment on a number of television shows, including a 1960 episode of 'The Shirley Temple Show', a series in which Shirley Temple introduced and narrated classic stories for children.

Answer: Eddie

The humor of this show was based on the fact that the Munsters thought they were a perfectly normal family, despite the fact that they were clearly 'monsters', with the exception of Marilyn, Lily's 'plain' niece, who bore a strong resemblance to Marilyn Monroe. Herman, the father, was in the mould of Frankenstein's monster; Lily was a vampire, as was her father (Grandpa, who lived with them), who may have been the original of Dracula; their son Eddie was a werewolf. Despite this, most of the storylines revolved around the same sort of material as was the case for the other family-based comedies of the '50s and '60s.

Eddie's pet dragon Spot lived in a lair under the stairs, from which he could be seen breathing fire when the entrance opened. When he actually emerged, he was represented only by his tail in most episodes, leaving the body to our imaginations. Other family pets included a raven called Charlie (usually voiced by Mel Blanc) who lived in the house's cuckoo clock, Grandpa's pet bat Igor (with which he was sometimes confused when in his bat form) and a black cat named Kitty, which roared like a lion.

Answer: Princess Fiona

Dragon is discovered by Donkey while he and Shrek are searching for Princess Fiona. He sweet-talks her into letting him go (and into an infatuation with him). She is infuriated when he appears to reject her overtures, but Donkey and Shrek escape with Princess Fiona. Donkey and Dragon later become a couple, and they help Shrek rescue Princess Fiona from her wedding to Prince Farquaad.

In later movies in the series, Dragon and Donkey have children called dronkeys.

Answer: Ollie

Oliver J. Dragon, called Ollie, was a member of the puppet show led by Kukla (Punch-like in appearance), whose members talked to Fran Allison in conversations that were largely ad-libbed. She provided sensible advice to help the puppets settle their squabbles. Other members of the troupe included Beulah Witch, Madame Oglepuss, Fletcher Rabbit, Colonel Crackie, and Ollie's young cousin Dolores Dragon.

The television show was the inspiration for the 1960 short story 'The Man Who Hated People' by Paul Gallico. This story was the basis of the 1953 film 'Lili', which was adapted into the 1961 Broadway musical 'Carnival!' (which was the first professional show I ever saw).

Answer: Peter Yarrow

Leonard Lipton was a friend of Peter Yarrow's housemate when they were college students, and Lipton used Yarrow's typewriter to compose a poem inspired by the Ogden Nash poem 'Custard the Dragon'. He left the poem in the typewriter case, where it was found and set to music by Yarrow. The song tells the story of the love between a dragon and a small child (originally a boy, but the lyrics were later modified to apply equally well to a female Jackie Paper), and the dragon's sorrow when his friend outgrows childhood's imaginary play.

'Puff the Magic Dragon' was the basis for several animated television specials, as well as a pantomime. In 2007, Yarrow and Lipton produced a book version of the song, in which the illustrations by Eric Puybaret show a grown up Jackie Paper introducing a young girl, presumably his daughter, to Puff. It was marketed accompanied by a CD of the song, and a plush dragon.

Answer: Fafner

Richard Wagner used a number of Germanic and Scandinavian myths as the basis for elements of his epic work, usually referred to simply as 'The Ring Cycle'. In Norse mythology, Fafnir was a son of the dwarf king Hreidmar, who turned into a dragon because of the curse of Andvari's ring and gold, and was then slain by Sigurd.

In Wagner's operas, Wotan (the chief of the gods) steals a magic ring which he gives to the giants Fafner and Fasolt as payment for building Valhalla for him to control as the home of the gods. Most of the events that follow are driven by his desire to regain the ring. His grandson Siegfried slays Fafner to recover the ring, but he is then slain after being betrayed by the son of the dwarf who originally fashioned the ring. Siegfried's lover, Brunnhilde, is a Valkyrie who immolates herself on his funeral pyre, returning the ring to the Rhine maidens and causing the destruction of Valhalla and the demise of the gods. For a slightly longer version of the story (but, at 22 minutes, well short of the 15 hours, usually spread over four nights, required to attend the original operas), you might like to look up Anna Russell's famous comedic routine - it can be found on Youtube.

Answer: Jimmy

Jimmy, played by Jack Wilde, and his magic talking flute Freddy were lured to the island in a magical boat under the control of Wilhelmina W. Witchiepoo, who wanted to get her hands on the flute. H. R. Pufnstuf rescued them both, and offered them protection against future attempts to take Freddy. These attacks, in which she was often assisted by Orson Vulture, and Jimmy's desire to go home, were the most common plot devices in the show.

Because it was a living island, all the (usually) inanimate objects such as houses, rocks and trees, could come to life and participate in events. The characters were all either plush-costumed or puppets, aside from Jimmy and Witchiepoo.

Answer: Norwegian Ridgeback

Norbert, later renamed Norberta for obvious reasons, was Hagrid's pet Norwegian Ridgeback dragon in 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's/Sorceror's Stone'. Hagrid hatched the dragon from an illegally-purchased egg, and fed it on brandy and chicken blood, as recommended in that classic manual, 'Dragon Breeding for Pleasure and Profit'. In the book, he had to send the dragon in secret to Romania, to be cared for by Charlie Weasley, after it bit Ron Weasley, finally convincing Hagrid that it had become too dangerous to keep. In the movie, the move to Romania was made after the staff of Hogswart had been made aware of the dragon's existence, and was not surreptitious as it was in the book.

In 'Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire', Viktor Krum used the Conjunctivitis Curse to get the golden egg being guarded by a Chinese Fireball dragon. Harry Potter faced the Hungarian Horntail, Cedric Diggory the Swedish Short-Snout, and Fleur Delacour a Common Welsh Green, which set her skirt on fire.

Answer: Spyro

Sonic is a hedgehog, Mario a plumber, and Pac-Man is a circular shape with a sector removed, to form a mouth that it uses to capture objects in the classic game. Spyro, however, is a dragon, who stars in a number of games including 'Spyro the Dragon' and 'The Legend of Spyro', as well as appearing in a number of other games.

He is a purple quadripedal dragon, smaller than most of his peers, which proves to be a useful feature at times. He was designed to be a character that would appeal to younger players, by being both cute and brash.