Stayin' Alive in '55 Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Warsaw Pact

Led by the USSR during the Cold War, the Warsaw Pact consisted of the People's Republic of Albania, People's Republic of Bulgaria, Czechoslovak Republic, German Democratic Republic, People's Republic of Hungary, People's Republic of Poland and the People's Republic of Romania. One of the reasons for forming the Warsaw Pact was the inclusion of West Germany in NATO earlier in 1955, but the main reason was that the USSR wanted to keep its control over Eastern and Central European forces.

Ironically, the Warsaw Pact's biggest military actions were against some of its own members; against Hungary in 1956 and in 1968 against Czechoslovakia. Albania withdrew from the Pact in 1968. When the Romanian Communist government was brought down by a revolution in 1989, this ended Romania's membership. Due to the reunification of Germany in 1990, East Germany left the pact.

In 1991 at a meeting of the USSR and the remaining members, the Warsaw Pact ended. The USSR itself also dissolved in 1991.

Question submitted by wenray.

Answer: Eddie Fisher & Debbie Reynolds

Eddie Fisher was one of the most popular crooners of the '50s. His star was tarnished when he left his wife Debbie Reynolds, considered America's sweetheart at the time, for Elizabeth Taylor. Mike Todd, Liz's third husband, was killed in a plane crash in 1958, and Eddie, a close friend of both of them, helped her through her loss. The plane Todd was flying in was called "Lucky Liz". Eddie and Liz wed in '59 and the marriage lasted five years. It ended when Liz met the love of her life, Richard Burton.

Debbie Reynolds went on to have a prolific and successful career in music, film, and television. Her most famous movie was probably "Singin' In The Rain" (1952) in which she starred and danced with Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor. She had a number one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1957 with "Tammy" from the movie "Tammy And The Bachelor" in which she starred. In the year 2000 at the age of 68 she was nominated at the Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her role as Grace Adler's mother, Bobbi Adler, in the NBC TV sitcom "Will & Grace". Still acting in her eighties she played Liberace's mother in "Behind the Candelabra" (2013).

Question submitted by fifiscot.

Answer: Jimi Hendrix

Muddy Waters was born McKinley Morganfield in Mississippi, but by the time he recorded "Mannish Boy" he was working in Chicago with Leonard Chess of Chess Records. He was later a major influence on The Rolling Stones, who took their name from another one of his hit singles.

I once drank champagne with Muddy Waters when I was about 20 in the early 1970s, in a nightclub in Montreal. My date and I were sitting near the stage applauding enthusiastically. At the break, Muddy's son and road manager introduced himself and invited us to be his dad's guests back in the dressing room after the show. We almost died of excitement! We went and we all had a great time. Muddy Waters was so kind and gentlemanly, and I mentioned I'd been to a John Lee Hooker concert about six months before, Muddy told me that he and John Lee, as he called him, were good friends and that he loved Hooker's music.

Question submitted by elmo7.

Answer: The Hovercraft

Christopher Cockerell designed and patented the first modern Hovercraft (also known as an air cushion vehicle or ACV) in 1955. It is described as a cross between an aircraft, boat and land vehicle, and people had been trying to make such a versatile means of transport for hundreds of years. After extensive testing, Cockerell's hovercraft made its maiden voyage across the English Channel from Calais to Dover on July 25, 1959, in 2 hours and 3 minutes.

Submitted by Possum1.

Answer: Lady and the Tramp

"Lady and the Tramp" starred among others Stan Freberg (The Beaver) and Peggy Lee (Darling, Si and Am, and Peg). As well as singing in the movie, Peggy Lee co-wrote the songs with Sonny Burke and assisted with the score.

In 1937 Joe Grant, a designer and story artist working for Disney, wrote an outline after observing how his own dog had been side-lined when his daughter was born. However, it was not until the '50s that a final treatment was approved and the movie developed.

The part where Lady (Barbara Dudding) is presented to Darling (Peggy Lee) in a hatbox exactly mirrors how Walt Disney presented his own wife with a chow puppy.

Peggy Lee sued the Walt Disney Company in 1988 for breach of contract, claiming that she retained the rights to transcriptions of the music. She was eventually awarded $2.3 million in 1991. In May 2005, Joe Grant died still at his desk in the Disney office at the age of 96.

Question submitted by Waitakere

Answer: United States of America

Despite the name, Roma tomatoes were developed in the USA, not Italy. In Australian and US supermarkets the Roma is generally of a higher standard and flavor than the other mass-produced varieties (though nothing beats garden-grown fruit!). Following its development as a tomato seed, it has been widely grown in the United States, Mexico and Australia but not in Italy. The Italians have their own variety of plum tomato, the San Marzano tomato, which is considered to have a more intense, sweeter flavor.

Question submitted by pitegny.

Answer: Waiting for Godot

"Waiting For Godot" is like that British culinary delight Marmite: you either love it or hate it. I've never been a theatre-lover, but when I was dragged to see it as a teenager I was flabbergasted: it all made absolute perfect sense but I couldn't have explained why, and I still can't.

Although Irish-born Beckett's native language was English, in the 1940s he started writing in the language of his adopted country, France. "En attendant Godot" was first performed in 1952 in France and the play was also published there that year. By the time it was performed in English in London in 1955, it had already been translated into German and performed in a German prison by the inmates in 1953. As the translator said at the time, "thieves, forgers, toughs, homos, crazy men and killers spend this life waiting ... and waiting ... and waiting. Waiting for what? Godot? Perhaps."

Question submitted by thula2.

Answer: To school

Claudette was a 15 year old schoolgirl at the time of her defiance of the Montgomery segregation laws. While yelling: "Itīs my constitutional right", she was handcuffed, dragged out of the bus and arrested. She was locked up for several hours before her Minister paid her bail. About the time of the incident, Claudette became pregnant and the NAACP was worried that this would cause negative publicity, given the attitudes of the time. She was put on trial, found guilty, and put on probation.

Despite this, the courageous teenager gave evidence in a court case in 1956, which found Montgomery's bus laws unconstitutional. This was one of the pivotal points for the freedom movement, focusing public attention on racial inequality.

Question submitted by jolana

Answer: 24 Hours of Le Mans

More than 80 people were killed and at least 120 injured in a tragedy at the 1955 24 Hours of Le Mans motor race in France.

The incident began when British driver Mike Hawthorn driving a Jaguar D-type, made an attempt to enter the pits. He cut across the path of the Austin Healey 100S driven by British driver Lance Macklin. This caused Macklin to swerve right into the path of the Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR driven by French driver Pierre Levegh. Levegh's car hit the back of Macklin's car and became airborne. It landed on an embankment, broke up and exploded into the crowd. Levegh was killed in the crash. The race continued to a finish which Mike Hawthorn won.

Much of the debate after the race blamed Hawthorn for the disaster but the official enquiry exonerated all of the drivers. It blamed the racing track layout, that had been built 30 years previously when cars were slower.

Question submitted by shipyardbernie.

Answer: The Hunter River Flood

The Hunter River Flood, also known as the Maitland Flood, was caused by a late February monsoon which brought torrential rain to an already saturated Hunter Valley, causing the Hunter and other rivers to burst their banks. 25 people were swept to their deaths. Army DUKWs and helicopters, even surf lifesaving boats, were employed to rescue many thousands of people trapped on rooftops, on railway platforms and high ground in rising floodwaters. Many thousands of livestock, including 2,000 cattle, were lost in the fast-moving floods.

Cyclone Mahina occurred in 1899 with much greater loss of life, the Newcastle earthquake was in 1989, and Black Saturday was a devastating series of fires in Victoria in February 2009 which took 173 human lives and destroyed many communities.

Question submitted by Windrush