Quiz Like it's 1999

Answer: Hussein I bin Talal

King Hussein of Jordan ruled from 1952, upon the resignation of his father, King Talal, until his death in 1999. During that time, he oversaw the suppression of an attempted military coup by the Palestinian Liberation Organization (known as 'Black September in Jordan'), refused to support Saddam Hussein in the first Gulf War (1991) and made a peace treaty with Israel in 1994.

He was reportedly a great fan of the 'Austin Powers' movies, and loved to do impressions of the character 'Dr. Evil'.

Answer: 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?'

The rules were simple: answer increasingly difficult trivia questions to get to the Grand Prize Question worth 1 million U.S. dollars. It took until November 19 of that year before John Carpenter of Hamden, Connecticut became the first to win the Grand Prize.

Answer: Wayne Gretzky

Boston and Chicago hockey legend Bobby Orr retired in 1979, 'St. Patrick' Roy of the Stanley Cup-winning Colorado Avalanche stepped down in 2003 and 'Super Mario' Lemieux of Pittsburgh fame retired in 2006. Gretzky was later the executive manager of the Canadian hockey team in the 2002 Winter Olympics and became part owner of the NHL expansion Phoenix Coyotes.

Answer: The Euro

The *monetary system* of the Euro entered into the world lexicon New Year's Day, 1999. Initially, it was a unit of accounting consisting of the various national currencies with their exchange rates firmly locked. The Euro coins and notes came into circulation in January 2002. EuroDisney first opened in 1992.

The Broadway musical 'Cats' premiered in 1981. The League of Nations lasted from 1919 to 1946.

Answer: Pluto

Eris, a dwarf planet named for the Greek goddess of discord and strife, was discovered and verified in 2005 with one known moon, Dysnomia. Their distance from the Sun is about three times that of Pluto, making them current most distant natural bodies in the Solar System. The other choices are all found in the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Answer: Melissa Virus

The notorious macro virus dubbed 'Melissa' was first discovered March 26. It effectively shut down E-mail and flooded servers. As if that wasn't enough, later in June, the 'ExploreZip' worm that destroyed tons of Microsoft Office documents, was detected. The Blaster worm surfaced in 2003 and Witty appeared the following year. Ghostball first appeared way back in 1989.

Answer: A hot-air balloon

Nearly 20 days before, Piccard and Brian Jones set off in the balloon 'Breitling Orbiter 3' from Switzerland on the non-stop balloon circumnavigation. The two finally landed in Egypt after a flight that stretched nearly 28,500 statute miles.

Answer: Oklahoma

The F5 twister (using the old Fujita scale ranking) that hit the Oklahoma City suburbs of Moore and Bridge Creek was clocked with winds of over 300 mph (483 kph). 65 other twisters descended in this outbreak, killing nearly 50 people in all, 38 in the Moore tornado alone.

Answer: Napster

Started by Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, Napster blazed the trail for other P2P sharing groups to follow. It was about a year after its birth that Metallica, Madonna and Dr. Dre filed lawsuits to protect their music from being downloaded without paying royalties under U.S. copyright laws. By 2002, the increasing litigation bankrupted the company.

Answer: Woodstock

Despite the best intentions, poor plumbing, hot weather and exorbitant prices pushed many of the 200,000 concertgoers to rebel as the three-day concert dragged on. Some acts, like Limp Bizkit and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, seemed to fan the flames as the festival deteriorated to an orgy of violence. It was definitely a far cry from the halcyon days on Max Yazgur's farm.