Determine the Decade Trivia Quiz

Answer: The 1920s

The Eighteenth Amendment, which established Prohibition, was ratified in 1919 to take effect in 1920, but a number of states had already instituted laws that curtailed in some way the use of alcoholic beverages by their inhabitants; and in 1917 President Wilson had instituted a wartime prohibition in order to conserve grain.

All activities outlawed under the Amendment went underground. Law enforcement had its hands full trying to weed out bootlegging operations and speakeasies. Organized crime was heavily involved in bootlegging and there were clashes between gangsters and Federal agents, famously exemplified by the Valentine's Day Massacre in 1929. This atmosphere eroded support for Prohibition, and it was repealed at the end of 1933 by the Twenty-First Amendment.

Answer: The 1960s

Timothy Leary famously advocated the use of lysergic acid diethylamide, or LSD, after conducting experiments through his position in the psychology department of Harvard University, in partnership with a fellow professor, Richard Alpert (later known as Baba Ram Dass). Although at the time drugs like LSD and psilocybin weren't illegal, the Establishment reacted so negatively to Leary and Alpert's advocacy of the use of psychedelics that the pair was eventually fired from Harvard.

The phrase, "Turn on, tune in, drop out", has been attributed to Marshall McLuhan, although Leary adopted it and made it famous.

Answer: The 1930s

The date of the accident was May 6, 1937. It is common knowledge that the airship was inflated with hydrogen gas, which is highly flammable. What may not be as well known is that airships had been crossing the Atlantic Ocean for some thirty years before the Hindenburg disaster, safely, quickly, and offering luxurious and comfortable travel. Airships cut the ocean crossing time in half compared to ocean voyages.

There were investigations of the accident by both American and German teams, and they reached the same conclusion, which has been upheld in subsequent inquiries as to the cause of the explosion: an electrostatic spark of some kind was generated, and the Hindenburg was leaking hydrogen gas. It took only 32 seconds to destroy the airship once the two met. Although 36 people died, amazingly, 62 people survived the accident.

Answer: 1970s

Richard Milhous Nixon resigned effective August 9, 1974, after it was discovered that he had knowledge of, and tried to subvert the investigation into, a break-in by The Committee to Re-Elect the President (aptly abbreviated CREEP) at the Democratic National Headquarters in the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. The burglary took place during Nixon's campaign for a second Presidential term.

Although in many ways Watergate has overshadowed much of Nixon's legacy, he accomplished a number of impressive things in his 5+ years in office. The Vietnam War was ending; foreign relations with China and the then Soviet Union were moved toward detente; and the Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty (SALT) deterred the Soviet Union from a first-strike aggression option, to name a few.

Answer: The 1980s

The Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the Ukraine suffered an explosion and fire on April 22, 1986. Later investigation revealed that a power surge was the trigger that caused the meltdown of the plant's Unit 4. Thirty-two people died either at the time of the accident or within three weeks of it, most due to acute radiation poisoning (ARP). Over 200 more individuals were diagnosed with radiation poisoning and some of those have passed away, but it is harder conclusively to attribute their deaths to the accident as time passes. In 2011 the site was allowed to be opened to tourists.

In 1990, the International Atomic Energy Agency established the International Nuclear Event Scale. It consists of seven levels categorized by the severity, breadth, and impact of nuclear accidents. A Level 7 event is characterized as:
"Major accident: Major release of radioactive material with widespread health and environmental effects, requiring implementation of planned and extended countermeasures."

The first two Level 7 nuclear catastrophes were the Chernobyl incident and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in 2011.

Answer: The 1960s

The two, who are widely credited with the discovery of the nucleic acids DNA and RNA, shared the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Maurice Wilkins, a native New Zealander who had studied sciences in England and worked on the Manhattan Project before taking up biophysics and doing nucleic acid research at King's College in London. Watson and Crick did their joint work at Cambridge.

Answer: The 1950s

Disneyland, in Anaheim, California opened on July 17, 1955. The park cost a mere $17 million to build! Walt Disney envisioned the park as a place for both amusement and learning. Nowadays, Disneyland generally takes in more than a billion dollars a year.

Answer: 1990s

On December 19, 1998, William Jefferson Clinton was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice after lying during an investigation into his conduct with White House intern Monica Lewinsky, but the Senate failed to convict him. Clinton was the second President to be impeached, Andrew Johnson having been the first, for a violation of the Tenure of Office Act. Johnson wasn't convicted either.

Articles of Impeachment were drawn up by the House of Representatives when Richard Nixon's degree of involvement in the Watergate scandal became known, but Nixon chose to resign rather than face almost certain impeachment and conviction.

Answer: The 1930s

FDR is strongly associated with being President during World War II, but he was first elected to the job in 1932 and began serving in March of 1933. He passed away while in office on April 12, 1945, succeeded by his Vice-President Harry S Truman. The early years of his terms were dominated by implementing measures to bring the US back to economic stability and prosperity following the Great Depression.

Answer: The 1900s

The Wright Brothers' famous first - a "controlled, powered and sustained heavier-than-air" flight - took place on December 17, 1903. There are a number of others who lay claim to having invented the airplane at approximately the same time as the Wrights, which is why there are so many qualifiers describing the conditions of flight they achieved first.