Librarians Rock! Trivia Quiz

Answer: Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong worked as an assistant librarian at Peking University between 1918-1919. The Chief Librarian at that time, Li Dazhao, was one of the first Chinese Marxists and a big influence on Mao. Ironically, Mao's Cultural Revolution almost destroyed the universities with intellectuals sent to labour camps and entrance exams cancelled.

Answer: Giacomo Casanova

Casanova is sometimes called 'the world's greatest lover' and his name is today used to describe a womaniser. The reason we know so much about him is because he had time to write his biography while working as a librarian for Count Waldstein of Bohemia. He must have had a lot of time to write as his memoirs run to twelve volumes!

Answer: Batgirl

Batgirl is the alter ego of Dr. Barbara Gordon who has a doctorate in library science. She is head of Gotham City Public Library. Barbara Gordon became Batgirl after rescuing Bruce Wayne from a kidnapping attempt when she was on her way to a costume ball dressed as a female Batman.

Answer: Benjamin Franklin

The first public library in America is considered to be the Franklin Public Library in Franklin, Massachusetts, which named itself in honour of Benjamin Franklin. The town asked him to donate a bell for the church tower, but Franklin instead gave books which were used to establish the library.

In a letter to Richard Price he wrote - "I have advised the sparing themselves the expense of a steeple, for the present, and that they would accept of books instead of a bell, sense being preferred to sound"

Answer: Warhammer 40,000

The tabletop miniatures game, Warhammer 40,000, has a race of elite modified humans called Space Marines. Space Marine Librarians have powerful psychic powers such as being able to rip apart space and slow down time and use these to strengthen other space marines in battle. When not fighting great battles, Space Marine Librarians keep themselves busy recording the deeds of their chapter.

Answer: Nancy Pearl

Nancy Pearl became known for developing a city-wide bookclub program called 'If All of Seattle Read the Same Book' and then went on to become a bestselling author when she published 'Book Lust' in 2003. She also hosts the 'Book Lust' program on the Seattle Channel. Toy company Archie McPhee developed an action figure in her likeness which comes with "amazing push-button shushing action!"
Laura Bush and Beverley Cleary both worked as librarians.

Answer: Slices him in two with his sword

'Conan the Librarian' is a parody of the 'Conan the Barbarian' character. In the movie 'UHF', Roger Callard plays 'Conan the Librarian' as a muscular, bare chested and fur clad guardian of the shelves. He speaks like Arnold Schwarzenegger and carries a very large two handed sword which he uses to slice the tardy patron in two.

Answer: J. Edgar Hoover

John Edgar Hoover worked at the Library of Congress for four years to pay for his education. He was the first director of the FBI. He served from 1935 until his death in 1972 and is a controversial figure because of the way he used his power and position to do dubious things such as harassing political activists and using illegal methods to collect evidence. Because of his behaviour FBI directors are now limited to terms of no more than ten years.

Answer: Melvil Dewey

Melvil Dewey was born in 1851 and is considered to be the pioneer of American librarianship. He developed the Dewey Decimal Classification system while working as assistant librarian at Amherst from 1874-1877. He also helped found the American Library Association and created the first library school to train librarians.

He was also a fervent advocate of spelling reform in the United States and considered changing the spelling of his name from 'Melville Dewey' to 'Melvil Dui', but in the end just changed the spelling of his first name.

Answer: The Librarian : The Secret of the Holy Grail

The Librarian franchise of movies was first released on American cable tv channel TNT in 2004 with the 'Quest for the Spear'. Noah Wyle plays Flynn Carson, a perpetual student who finally gets a job after being kicked out of college with 22 degrees. The job is librarian at the Metropolitan Public Library where he is entrusted with protecting historic and magical items from a secret section of the library.