"Golden" Girls Trivia Quiz

Answer: Laura Ingalls Wilder

Although all four authors had a profound impact on American writing, Laura Ingalls Wilder was nearly 65 when her first book, "Little House in the Big Woods" was published in 1932. Born in Wisconsin, Wilder lived in rural areas throughout the midwest, moving whenever her father's wanderlust struck him. The series of her eight "Little House" novels for children were published over nine years. The most famous, "Little House on the Prairie" was the third book in the series, published in 1935 and turned into a television series in 1974. The show included material from the other "Little House" books.

There were also non-fiction books about her life published posthumously. Of note was "Pioneer Girl", on which many of the fictionalized "Little House" books were based. "Pioneer Girl" included many incidents which were not meant for children to read.

Louisa May Alcott is most famous for "Little Women", which was published when she was 36, and its sequel, "Little Men". She died at age 55. Harriet Beecher Stowe was 40 when the first installment of the book which would become the beautifully-crafted attack on slavery called "Uncle Tom's Cabin" was published in a newspaper called "The National Era". Edith Wharton was also 40 when her first novel was published in 1902. She won a Pulitzer Prize for her 1920 novel "The Age of Innocence", which has been filmed several times over the years.

(Question by goodreporter)

Answer: Arthritis in her fingers.

Anna Mary Robertson was born in Greenwich, New York in 1860 to a farming family who owned a mill. She developed her love of art during the time she spent as a pupil in a one-room school, which were common in rural communities in the United States at the time. Even as a child, Anna created her own colors, using combinations of fruit juice, flour, ochre, sawdust and even grass to paint landscapes.

At age 27, while working as a housekeeper for wealthier families, she married Thomas Salmon Moses, who worked at a farm to which she had recently moved. Saving their money, they bought their own farm and Anna had ten children, five of whom lived to adulthood. When her husband died at age 67, by which time she was known as "Mother Moses", she gave up farming and moved in with one of her daughters. Inspired most of her life by beautiful objects, she showed her creativity by crafting beautiful embroidery. But as she aged, the arthritis in her fingers ended her ability to do her cherished needlework. So she picked up a paintbrush and switched to the art form for which she would become so well-known, painting as an American folk artist, Grandma Moses.

Those works of Grandma Moses are lovely--images of rural and farming life from another era, health and happiness. They can make us smile, shed a tear perhaps for long-ago childhoods, and long to step into their frames to be part of all the happiness portrayed within.

(Question by Creedy)

Answer: Julia Child

Julia Child was born in Pasadena, Ca. in 1912. She was first introduced to the joys of fine cuisine by her husband Paul, who had lived in Paris. They met after Julia had spent part of the war years as an American spy for the Office of Strategic Services (the predeccessor of the CIA). Part of her job there was to cook up something that would repel sharks, which kept on setting off underwater explosives around Asia. (The shark repellent is still used today.)

After the war she married Paul and he was posted by the US State Department to Paris. Julia attended the famous Le Cordon Bleu cooking school. She met two female French chefs who were working on a cookbook for the American market, at the women's cooking club "Le Cercle des Gourmettes". They asked her to join them as both an advisor on how to make the book appeal to Americans and to translate it into English. The resulting book, "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" was published in 1961 when Julia was 49 and became a bestseller. It is still in print today. Appearing on TV to promote the book, Julia's demonstration of how to make an omelette was so popular that she was asked to star in her own cooking show.

"The French Chef" first aired in 1963 and made 51-year-old Julia a household name. The show ran for a decade, winning both Peabody and Emmy awards. She went on to star in other shows and published numerous other books. In 2009, Meryl Streep portrayed her in "Julie and Julia".

Julia Child died in 2004 at the age of 91. Perhaps those who criticized her recipes for containing unhealthy amounts of butter and cream might need to revise their opinions!

(Question by emiloony)

Answer: Sister Kenny

Elizabeth Kenny was born in a small country town in New South Wales, Australia in 1880. As a young teenager, following a broken wrist she sustained in a fall from her horse, she developed an interest in the human body and its muscular and skeletal structures. By sheer hard work and determination, she trained herself to a competent nursing level, and then spent some years travelling around outback Australian towns treating and nursing those in need of care.

After working in a midwifery hospital, she got a letter of reference from the doctor there and a new nurse's uniform. She started calling herself Sister Kenny (the title that is used for nurses in some countries) and traveled by horse to the western part of Australia, perfecting her nursing skills as she went.

By 1911, she started nursing children suffering from polio in one of the many epidemics that swept through Australia. Kenny was unsure of what to do since the only medical advice she was given was to treat the symptoms. She instinctively felt that heat was a possible treatment. She applied heated compresses--known as "hot packs"--to their limbs and these immediately provided some pain relief. Some children even recovered completely, but it would still be some time before Kenny developed this treatment further. Following World War I, she worked on hospital ships and set up her own hospital in Australia to treat victims of the world-wide Spanish flu epidemic.

By 1932, when she was in her fifties, a huge poliomyelitis outbreak in Queensland suddenly saw Sister Kenny's treatment of the disease push her into the spotlight, fighting against the standard "treatments" of the day. She began setting up clinics throughout Australia and England to treat the thousands of (mostly) children with polio. Her treatments consisted of the application of heat packs, along with loads of exercise. In this she was in direct conflict with the standard treatments of the 1930. Tradition had the limbs immobilized in plaster for months which resulted in the muscles withering away, losing all power, with many being forced to use an iron lung to force muscles to help them breathe. These permanently disabled children were then put in iron braces and on crutches, or in wheelchairs. At night they slept in rigid splints. By contrast, Sister Kenny's methods restored function fully or partially to the affected limbs. Both the British and Australian medical establishments derided the treatment developed by a mere bush nurse.

In 1940, the government of Queensland encouraged Elizabeth Kenny, the tall, determined bush nurse from outback Australia to go to the United States. She opened up Sister Kenny treatment centers throughout the country, as well as in Europe, saving thousands of children and adults from a lifetime of disability. In 1950, President Truman signed a bill giving her the freedom to enter and leave the States without a visa. The only other non-American ever granted that right before her was the Marquis de Lafayette, the French leader who helped the colonies in the American Revolution. Sister Kenny, worn out after a lifetime of service, recognized as a medical pioneer around the world, returned to Australia and died in the town where she was born. Right up until a few weeks before her death, she still used her strength to help children with polio at a nearby clinic.

(Question by Creedy)

Answer: Titanic

Gloria Stuart was born on July 4, 1910 and started acting while in high school. She became a stage actress and in 1932 signed a contract with Universal Pictures. She starred in numerous movies, but never really found the success she felt she deserved. In 1945 at the age of 35 she gave up acting in order to take up a career as an artist.

In May 1996 she was approached to play the role of Old Rose in "Titanic". The movie is centered on the characters Jack and Rose, a young couple who fall in love on the Titanic in the days before it sinks. Part of the movie focuses on 100-year-old Rose in the current day, telling the story of her romance with Jack- hence the character of "Old Rose". Six days after her 86th birthday she was formally offered the role and went on to be nominated for both a Golden Globe and an Academy Award for best supporting actress. The movie enjoyed huge success, winning ten Oscars, but none for Stuart or Kate Winslet, who had been nominated for playing the young Rose. Over the following few years Stuart received a lot of attention, appearing in numerous interviews and documentaries. She was subsequently approached for other movie roles, and in 2000 was awarded a star on the Hollywood walk of fame. At age 94, Stuart acted in her final movie in 2004. She died on September 26, 2010 at the age of 100.

(Question by emiloony)

Answer: Golda Meir, of Israel

Golda Meir was given the unofficial title of the "Iron Lady" of Israeli politics long before Margaret Thatcher was given that name in the United Kingdom.

Meir was born in the Ukraine in 1898, emigrated to the United States in 1906, where she lived in Milwaukee and became a teacher. She and her husband Morris Meyerson (she shortened it to "Meir") emigrated to Israel in 1921, where she immediately became involved in politics.

By 1946 she had become the chief negotiator between the Jewish Agency and the British Mandate government for the rights of Jews in Palestine. She was one of the 24 people who signed Israel's Declaration of Independence in 1948. When Israeli statehood was declared, David Ben-Gurion appointed her to represent Israel's all-important interests dealing with the Soviet government of Joseph Stalin.

After holding the ministerial posts in several different government agencies, Meir was elected by her party to take over the office of Prime Minister of Israel in March, 1979, just weeks after the unexpected death of Prime Minister Levi Eshkol. Although she was seen as a woman with a will of iron, several incidents shook her leadership of Israel. In 1972 she took a hard line against the terrorist murderers who killed 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics, sending hit teams out to kill those responsible. But a botched killing by one of the teams in Norway--resulting in the death of an innocent waiter--leading to much of the team's capture turned many against Meir.

And Anwar Sadat's brilliantly-executed plan to start a war with Israel on Yom Kippur in 1973 nearly succeeded because the Israeli military was totally unprepared. The Israelis managed, with the help of the United States in the background, to win the war. But Meir was blamed for the near-disaster. Even though her party won the elections in late 1973, she resigned from office in April, 1974. Meir did have one last moment on the international stage, meeting with Anwar Sadat during his historic 1977 visit to Israel, where the two joked together. Meir died in December, 1978 at the age of 80.

(Question by goodreporter)

Answer: Kathryn Bigelow

Kathryn Bigelow is an American director, writer, and producer who was born November 27, 1951 in San Carlos, California. Bigelow began her directing career with a short film entitled "The Set-Up" in 1978, will her first full-length film, "The Loveless", following three years later in 1981. While some of her works won Saturn Awards and different film festival awards, it wasn't until 2008, at the age of 57, that she made history by becoming the first woman to win the Best Director Academy Award. Her film, "The Hurt Locker" is about an American munitions demolition team during the Iraq war.

(Question by tiffanyram)

Answer: Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson (1907-1964) studied biology at the Pennsylvania School for Women, and zoology at Johns Hopkins. She worked for the US Bureau of Fisheries when she began writing essays and articles for various newspapers and magazines. Her 1962 work, "Silent Spring", is considered to have been a huge contributor to the environmental movement due to Carson's blending of poetic language with scientific knowledge. Even before publication, it came under severe attack from the chemical industry. Carson died two years after it was published, not knowing that more than 50 years after her death her book would continue to be cited as one of the landmarks in advancing environmental science.

(Question by tiffanyram)

Answer: Judge Judy

Judith Sheindlin (née Blum) began her career as a lawyer in 1965 and was appointed a criminal court judge in New York in 1982. In 1986 Mayor Ed Koch then appointed her to be supervising judge in Manhattan's Family Court. She earned a reputation for being tough and wanting to ensure the court system was working for the good of the people. Judith wrote a book called "Don't Pee on My Leg and Tell Me It's Raining" after appearing in a "60 Minutes" segment about her career. It was after this that she was given the offer of starring in a courtroom show. "Judge Judy" first aired in 1996 and in 2015, Judith was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records as having been the longest-running judge on a courtroom television show. It is believed she is the highest-paid person in television, making more than $47 million in 2018.

(Question by tiffanyram)

Answer: Estelle Getty

Estelle Getty was 62--give or take a year--when "The Golden Girls" rocketed her to stardom for her delicious portrayal of "Sophia Petrillo", the 80-something mother whose recent stroke had stripped her of all diplomacy in her interactions with everyone around her. When Getty was suggested for the part of actress Bea Arthur's mother, producers initially rejected her because she looked far too young. Walking in with a short gray wig, makeup that added wrinkles and walking slightly hunched over, Getty reportedly got the part by simply walking in and waving to the producers, who didn't recognize her.

Getty had spent most of her life working in theater in New York, primarily in both off-Broadway and Yiddish language productions. She started appearing in small parts in films in the late 1970s. in 1985, she played Cher's mother in "Mask" and snagged the role in "The Golden Girls". Actress Bea Arthur, who played her daughter, lied about her age for years. But most sources who found what appears to be Arthur's birth certificate say she was actually one to two years older than Getty.

Arthur had been famous in New York theater since the 1950s and won a Tony in 1966 playing opposite Angela Lansbury in the Broadway debut of "Mame". Although she had appeared in a long string of television shows since the early 1950s, she broke through as a star playing "Maude" from 1972 to 1978. "Maude" was where 38-year-old Rue McClanahan first became widely known, playing Arthur's uptight neighbor "Vivian", a part about as far a cry as possible from the promiscuous southern belle "Blanche Devereaux" that she played in "The Golden Girls".

And Betty White, the only one of the four still alive as of this writing, had become a star in the early days of television. She both starred in and produced her own series, "Life with Elizabeth" from 1953 to 1955, when she was just 31. Over the decades, White continued to star in shows, from "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" to "Hot in Cleveland". It is believed White has had the longest career in television of any actor--female or male.

(Question by goodreporter)