Compound Disinterest Trivia Quiz

Answer: Hydrogen

On May 6, 1937, the Hindenburg burst into flames while landing in New Jersey, leading to 36 fatalities. It was a dirigible, a lighter than air craft, that carried close to 100, including crew and passengers. The hydrogen gas that held the Hindenburg aloft was highly flammable, leading to a rapid spread of flame.

After the Hindenburg explosion there was a shift away from hydrogen towards helium being used in keeping lighter than aircraft aloft.

Answer: Gold

On January 24, 1848, carpenter James Marshall found flakes of gold, while building a watermill for John Sutter near Coloma, CA. As word of the discovery spread, hundreds of thousands of people traveled to northern California over the next decade. Collectively they are sometimes called the Forty Niners since many arrived in that year. Within a few years, California would become a US state and San Francisco would grow from a small village to a city of over 30,000.

Answer: Nickel

Businessman Joseph Wharton became involved in the nickel processing business in 1863, including a nickel mine and refining operation. With a near-monopoly on nickel production in the USA, he wished to increase the use of nickel. Some of this use went into the US mint producing three cent coins (1865-1889) and five cent coins (starting 1866) that were made of a 25% nickel and 75% copper alloy. Generally speaking, pure nickel has not been used much in coins because the hardness of the metal makes it challenging to place a design on the coin with a die.

Answer: Sulfur

Preachers of "The First Great Awakening" in the United States, such as Jonathan Edwards, were known as "fire and brimstone" preachers. Brimstone is an old-fashioned term for sulfur. Edwards' sermon describes sinners held over the pit of hell and only kept out by the grace of God. Even today, the speech contains powerful imagery, asking the listener to imagine God holding the sinner as a person would hold a loathsome spider. An eyewitness to his delivery of the sermon described great emotion and despair in the reactions of the listeners.

Answer: Silver

William Jennings Bryan was the Democratic nominee for President of the United States in 1896, 1900, and 1908. In the first two campaigns he emphasized free coinage of silver as part of his platform. At the time the United States, as were a number of other countries, was moving to a gold standard for their money systems.

The plan Bryan supported would have an increase in silver coinage at a ratio of 16:1 to gold, generally increasing the amount of money is circulation. Bryan lost all three of his attempts for the presidency and the US was on the gold standard by 1900.

Answer: Chlorine

While there were examples of chlorination of water to make it pure before 1908, the water supply of Jersey City, New Jersey, was the first case where it was done regularly. A diluted solution of calcium hyperchlorite (chloride of lime) was introduced into the Boonton Reservoir at a rate of 2-3.5 ppm. John Leal and George Fuller were responsible for developing this process. Today, chlorination helps to stop diseases such as typhoid, dysentery, and cholera.

Answer: Carbon

Thomas Edison and his team at Menlo Park conducted trials to develop a better incandescent light bulb in 1879. His team was not the first to create this type of light bulb, but previous examples burned out more quickly than was practical. Edison's innovation was the use of a carbon filament in the light bulb. Even so, the incandescent light bulb is an inefficient way to create light with about 95% of the energy lost as heat.

Answer: Astatine

Dale R. Corson, Kenneth Ross MacKenzie, and Emilio G. Segrč, working at the University of California, Berkeley, discovered Astatine in 1940. Though it occurs naturally in the earth's crust, Astatine is relatively unstable with a half life measured in hours.

It forms as a decay product of heavier elements. The radioactivity of astatine makes it difficult to gather information about its physical properties. One of the synthesized isotopes, Astatine-211, is used in research in nuclear medicine.

Answer: Iron

William Kelly and Henry Bessemer each independently developed processes to blow air across molten iron to lessen carbon impurities, turning the iron into steel. In comparison with iron, steel is both harder and stronger, allowing steel to be used ways that are impractical for carbon. Both men developed their process in the 1850s. Financial difficulties in the late 1850s caused William Kelly to need to sell his patent rights. Over time, Bessemer's name became more well known and associated with the technique.

Answer: Tin

The Kent State Massacre at Kent Stae University in Ohio took place on May 4, 1970 when four students were killed at a peace rally protesting US involvement in the Vietnam War. The protest took place on the commons a few days after a previous protest. Between the two protests, units of the National Guard had been brought in, who fired into the crowd on the fourth.

In their 1970 song "Ohio", Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young referenced the event, calling the National Guard "tin soldiers".