WAMC's Ian Pickus and resident quizzer Mike Nothnagel express their last name envy on this week's show.
Last week's challenge
Start with the phrase HOLIDAY TIME. Rearrange the letters and you can spell a five-letter county in the Western Hemisphere and six-letter word you often hear during holidays. What are the words?
Answer: HAITI, MELODY.
THIS WEEK'S CATEGORY: PEOPLE WHOSE NAMES ARE PROFESSIONS
On-air questions: December 8, 1973 marked the second week that "Top of the World" by The Carpenters was the number one song on the Billboard Hot 100 charts. The song was not originally scheduled to be a single, but after a singer named Lynn Anderson released a cover of the song earlier in 1973, the Carpenters decided to release their version as a single. To commemorate the Carpenters' number-one hit, this week our questions are about people whose last names are professions.
1. A British orchardist named Maria Ann Smith moved to Australia in the 1830s, and some 30 years later got a box of crabapples from a farmer's market. After discarding the peels onto a compost pile, she noticed a seedling growing. This seedling bore fruit, which eventually became the apple variety we know as what?
2. After maintaining an undefeated record into 1972, George Foreman defended his title against Joe Frazier, Ken Norton, and, in a 1974 match fought in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo nicknamed "The Rumble in the Jungle", against whom?
3. What singer released in 2015 an album titled Paradise Is There: The New Tigerlily Recordings, a collection of – as the title implies – re-recordings of the songs on her 1995 solo debut album Tigerlily, including "Wonder" and "Jealousy"?
4. What famed jockey, by the time of his retirement in 1990, racked up some 8800 career victories out of more than 40,000 races run, won eleven total Triple Crown races – although never the Triple Crown itself – and became in 1986 the oldest jockey to win the Kentucky Derby, doing so at age 54?
5. First elected to the U.S. Senate in 1992, Barbara Boxer is, to date, one of three women who have served as a senator from California. Who are the other two?
Extra credit
1. Actress Marsha Mason has been nominated for an Academy Award four times. Three of the four roles – those in The Goodbye Girl, Chapter Two, and Only When I Laugh – were written by whom?
2. Portraying an adult version of the main character Ralph Parker, author Jean Shepherd narrates what 1983 film, based on Shepherd's 1966 novel In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash?
This week's challenge
Start with the word CARPENTERS. Change one letter to a T and you can rearrange the result to spell a two-word phrase (six letters, four letters) for something that happened not that long ago. What is it?
ANSWERS
On-air questions
1. Granny Smith
2. Muhammad Ali
3. Natalie Merchant
4. Willie Shoemaker
5. Dianne Feinstein, Kamala Harris
Extra credit
1. Neil Simon
2. A Christmas Story
