What If? Trivia Quiz

Answer: George H.W. Bush

John Hinckley Jr. attempted to assassinate US President Ronald Reagan outside of the Washington Hilton Hotel in order to impress "Taxi Driver" actress Jodie Foster. Hinckley missed Reagan with all six his initial shots. He did however hit White House Press Secretary James Brady, police officer Thomas Delahanty and Secret Service agent Tim McCarthy. The final bullet only struck Reagan due to an unfortunate ricochet off the limousine's armoured body. At the subsequent trial Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity.

Article II, Section 1, Clause 6 of the US Constitution states that the vice president is first in line of succession. The 25th Amendment further clarifies that this includes if the incumbent resigns, is removed from office or dies. George H.W. Bush, as Reagan's vice president, would immediately have become president if Hinckley had in fact managed to assassinate Reagan. Bush went on to take office in 1989, succeeding Reagan as US President.

Answer: Robert Falcon Scott

The race to the South Pole was never a race in the strictest sense, as the Amundsen and Scott expeditions did not leave at the same time. Amundsen left from Norway in June 1910 and Scott in November 1911. As it turned out, Amundsen managed to beat Scott to the South Pole by a mere five weeks achieving his goal on December 14th, 1911. Scott, when discovering this, wrote in his diary, "The worst has happened"; "All the day dreams must go"; "Great God! This is an awful place".

Robert Peary explored the North Pole, Shackleton tried very hard unsuccessfully to get to the South Pole and Richard Byrd was an aviator who flew to both poles.

Answer: Discovering penicillin

As a physician, microbiologist and pharmacologist, Alexander Fleming seemed to be in the prime position to have discovered something great. His discovery of penicillin was not as accidental as one might think, as he was on working antibacterial substances at the time. Upon returning from his holiday, he noticed a strange fungus on his staphylococcus culture and that it had killed the staphylococcus on the culture.

He identified the mould to be 'Penicillium notatum' and named the substance that was taken from a pure culture of the mould, penicillin.

He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945.

Answer: Hanging

Jack the Ripper was a brutal serial killer to whom at least five murders were attributed. There were eleven murders in total, but police were not able to conclusively link all eleven. The 'canonical five' as Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes, and Mary Jane Kelly are known, were all killed in and around the Whitechapel area. The moniker "Jack the Ripper" was taken from an apparent confession letter sent to Scotland Yard and the media.

The punishment for murder in the Victorian Era was hanging. To be fair, there were almost two hundred crimes for which a person could be hanged including pick pocketing and petty theft, but then as now murder was the worst crime of all.

Answer: The Great Pyramid of Giza

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World were The Great Pyramid of Giza, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, the Colossus of Rhodes, the Mausoleum of Halicarnuss, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia and the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.

The Great Pyramid of Giza was constructed around 2560 BC and is still mostly intact. Of the remaining six, only the origin of the Gardens is disputed and many scholars have suggested they may not have existed at all. The Mausoleum, Lighthouse and Colossus were all destroyed by earthquakes and the Statue of Zeus and Temple of Artemis were destroyed by fire.

Answer: Concord

Paul Revere was not only a silversmith, but more importantly a Patriot in the American Revolution. The British had been given orders to invade Concord in order to apprehend the rebel leaders, specifically Samuel Adams and John Hancock as well as removing all weapons from the rebels.

At the time, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress were sitting in Concord. Revere set up a system where by lanterns would be lit once intelligence had been received on the British invasion, one if by land and two if by sea. Fortunately the correct lanterns were lit and thanks to Revere's midnight ride the rebels were able to prevent major losses.

Answer: West Indian Ocean Coelacanth

Prior to Courtenay-Latimer's discovery, the Coelacanth was believed to have been extinct since the Late Cretaceous era. This specimen was caught off the coast of South Africa and identified by Professor L.B.J. Smith. Described as a living fossil, the Coelacanth is a remarkable looking fish. It has thick cosmoid scales, which have a hard enamel like layer. It also has eight fins. Subsequent to this discovery, a number of specimens have been caught along the African coast from the Comores, to Kenya, Mozambique and South Africa. The Indonesian Coelacanth was identified in the late 1990s, also another accidental discovery in a local market by Mark V. Erdman .

I have actually seen the 1938 Coelacanth up close at the East London Museum on the South African east coast. It is quite magnificent to see in person. Incidentally, they also house the world's only dodo egg.

Answer: Elephants

Pachydermophobia is of course the fear of elephants. Hannibal was a general from the Phoenician state of Carthage which was situated in Northwest Africa. He probably best known for his extraordinary feat of crossing the Alps with elephants during the Second Punic War 218 BC in an attack on the Roman Empire.

Much of what we know of his journey was chronicled by Polybius, a Greek historian and Titus Livy, a Roman hostorian. A prisoner named L.Cincius Alimentus estimated Hannibal's troops at approximately 100,000, but the number of elephants were not mentioned in either the writings of Polybius or Titus Livy. Both texts indicate that there were severe losses, so one can assume that Hannibal descended into Roman territory with very few elephants remaining.

Answer: One

The Anglo-Zanzibar war is the shortest recorded war in history. It lasted between thirty-eight and forty-five minutes. An 1886 treaty determined that any candidate wanting to ascend to the sultanate had to ask permission of the British consul. Upon the death of Sultan Hamad bin Thuwaini, Sultan Khalid bin Barghash succeeded him without the necessary permissions being sought.

The British saw this as an act to provoke war and demanded he stand down. Needless to say, the new sultan refused and on the morning of August 27th, 1896 bombardment of the palace ensued. Five hundred Zanzibari troops and civilians were killed or injured and the sultan's yacht, the HHS Glasgow was sunk. Only one British sailor was reported as injured.

Answer: United Nations Secretary-General

Dag Hammarskjöld was an economist from Sweden who replaced Norwegian politician Trygvie Lie in this prestigious position. At the time, Canadian Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson received the majority vote, but was vetoed by the Soviet Union. Hammarskjöld's name was then put forward and his nomination was unexpectedly supported by the Soviet Union.

The British and U.S. approved and Dag Hammarskjöld became the second Secretary-General of the United Nations. While travelling to the Congo to intervene in fighting between the UN and troops from the breakaway state of Katanga, the Douglas DC-6 that Hammarskjold was travelling on crashed near the city of Ndola, Northern Rhodesia (now known as Zambia). Multiple claims have been made through the years that Hammarskjöld was in fact assassinated and that the aircraft was deliberately shot down. Various claims have suggested that the CIA, MI6, a Belgian Mining Company and a South African paramilitary unit were involved.

The South African Intelligence Agency have paperwork that indicates a CIA plot, but the veracity of these documents have never been established. Hammarskjöld was replaced as Secretary-General by U Thant of Burma.