Weekly Quiz - Pre 2019
Easter Parade
Among the most famous songs of the great Jewish composer Irving Berlin are White Christmas and Easter Parade. Bing Crosby introduced Easter Parade in the movie Holiday Inn in 1942. But Berlin first wrote this melody in 1917 with different lyrics. What was this original version of Easter Parade?
Holiday Inn (1942) by Insomnia Cured Here is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
A. Being With My Honey, including the lyrics “Days are bright and sunny/When I am with my honey/There’s no more fun than holding hands and walking along.”
B. Marriage Made Right, including the lyrics “Candlelight and roses/Are musts when one proposes/To guarantee she knows that you’re the fellow for her.”
C. Smile and Show Your Dimple, including the lyrics “Smile and show your dimple/You’ll find it’s very simple/You can think of something comical in a very little while.”
D. Stars and Stripes Forever, including the lyrics “Stars and stripes forever/Let no one ever sever/The bonds that hold together the great U S of A.”
E. Purim Parade, including the lyrics “Now it’s time for noshin/So eat your hamantaschen/Then loudly shake your gragger at the Purim parade.”
Purim Customs
There are many different ways in which children around the world celebrate Purim. Which of the following is not a Purim custom?
A. Children in Italy divide into two teams and throw nuts at each other.
B. Children in Tunisia make “Hamans” out of paper or rags and straw. Everyone then gathers around a bonfire and throws these “Hamans” into the fire, after which they beat the burning “Hamans” with sticks.
C. In Germany, cakes which are called “Haman” are baked in the shape of dolls. Children delight in cutting off the heads and eating them.
D. Bukharan children build a snow-Haman with charcoal eyes and a carrot nose. They then surround the snow-Haman with wood and rags that they ignite, causing the snow-Haman to melt as they sing songs.
E. At Trump Tower, little Trump children build a wall with their toy blocks. They then bake gingerbread Hamans, which they throw over the wall while chanting, “Get 'em out of here. Go back where you came from. Cursed is Haman and Mexicans and Muslims. Blessed is Mordechai and the USA and the Donald.”
Merrick Garland
BONUS QUESTION
In addition to our weekly Monday trivia question, we are pleased to present a bonus Thursday question.
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Merrick Garland, who if approved would be the 4th Jewish person to sit on the current United States Supreme Court, was not the first member of his family to receive an appointment from a president. What relative of his shares that honor?
Supreme Court Authority of Law Statue by Matt Wade is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
A. As Merrick Garland said in his speech on the White House lawn, his maternal grandfather, Irving Horowitz, came to America from the Pale of Settlement in the early 1900’s. At the same time, Irving’s brother Sam went to Palestine and settled in Jerusalem. His grandson, Dr. Yishai Horowitz, a surgeon, was appointed in 1973 by Israeli president Ephraim Katzir to be head of the Magen David Adom, Israel’s version of the Red Cross.
B. Samuel Irving Rosenman, a relative of Garland’s wife Lynn Rosenman Garland, was a lawyer who was active in Democratic politics in New York in the early 1900’s. He served in the New York State Assembly throughout most of the 1920’s, and in 1932 was appointed to the New York Supreme Court by then-governor and eventual president, Franklin D. Roosevelt.
C. Garland’s mother, Shirley Horowitz Garland, worked for many years as the director of volunteer services at Chicago’s Council for Jewish Elderly. In 1987, President Ronald Reagan appointed her to the Board of Directors of the National Council on Aging, where she served for seven years.
D. Howard Rosenman, a relative of Garland’s wife Lynn Rosenman Garland, is a Hollywood producer of such films as Father of the Bride and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Following the controversy over the lack of diversity in Academy Awards nominations, he was appointed last month by Cheryl Boone Isaacs, president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to a committee whose task is to study this issue, with a goal of recommending improvements to the Oscar nominating process.
E. In 1910, Merrick Garland’s maternal grandfather, Jacob Horowitz, emigrated from the Pale of Settlement to America, settling on the Lower East Side of New York. He worked as an itinerant peddler, and eventually saved enough money to open a storefront. In need of a location for his shop, Horowitz asked his apartment landlord to get him an appointment with the president of the real estate company that owned his building, Friedrich Drumpf. Horowitz went to the appointment, where Mr. Drumpf proceeded to yell at him about immigrants and all the problems they were causing, finally ending the meeting by yelling, “Get out. Get him out. Go back to Russia.”
Marco Rubio
With polls showing Marco Rubio dropping to third place
in Florida, this Tuesday’s Florida primary could bring the end
to his presidential campaign. Before he goes, here’s a
question about Marco that comes straight out of
RASHI, RAMBAM and
PRESIDENTIAL-DINGDONG
A Quizbook of Presidential Jewish Trivia Facts & Fun
Click here
to learn how you can get 59 more unbelievable
but true questions about this year’s
unbelievable but true crop of presidential candidates.
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When Marco Rubio gave the Republican response to President Obama’s 2013 State of the Union address, why did the National Jewish Democratic Council criticize Rubio?
Marco Rubio by Gage Skidmore is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
A. They criticized him because the bottled water that he grabbed during his speech was not kosher.
B. They criticized him because he said that the United States was founded based on Christian values.
C. They criticized him because he did not mention Israel in his speech.
D. They criticized him because he said that the lack of peace in the Middle East falls solely on the Palestinian Authority.
E. Rubio spoke both English and Spanish during his speech. The National Jewish Democratic Council criticized him, saying “Mr. Rubio proclaims his love for Israel while at the same time pursuing policies which are hurtful to Spanish speaking immigrants. Given that, he should have spoken Hebrew rather than Spanish.”
O. J. Simpson
O. J. Simpson is back in the news, as we learn of a knife that is being examined by the Los Angeles Police Department. Might it be the murder weapon used to kill Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman? O. J. Simpson has a connection to Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. What is that connection?
Image courtesy of Charles LeBlanc is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
A. Netanyahu lived in America on and off in the 1950’s and 1960’s, as well as throughout most of the 1970’s, when he studied at MIT and Harvard. As a result, he was a huge football fan, in particular of the Philadelphia Eagles, as he had graduated from Cheltenham High School, a Philadelphia suburb. In 1976, Netanyahu attended a game between the Eagles and O. J.’s team, the Buffalo Bills, and after the game Netanyahu met with Simpson in the Bills locker room. Said Netanyahu at the time, “It was great to meet O. J. No matter what else I ever do in my life, I think this will always rank as the most thrilling.”
B. When Benjamin Netanyahu was studying at Harvard, he earned extra money by tutoring bar and bat mitzvah students. One of his students was Ron Goldman. Netanyahu attended Goldman’s bar mitzvah, and when Goldman was murdered, Netanyahu flew from Israel to the United States to pay a shiva call to the Goldman family.
C. In the late 1970’s, O. J. was hired as a spokesman for Hertz rental car company, and he filmed a famous series of ads depicting him racing to the Hertz rental car counter, sometimes jumping over furniture and barricades, sometimes flying above the crowd. When one of these ads began running in Israel, Netanyahu called on the Israeli Broadcasting Authority to ban the ad. He said, “At a time when our enemies are attempting to hijack and blow up airplanes, we cannot encourage people to run past barriers in our airports.” Despite his efforts, the ads remained on the air.
D. Shortly after Benjamin Netanyahu was elected prime minister for the first time, Attorney Alan Dershowitz met with him in Israel. At one point, Netanyahu said, “I want to go to the secret office where no one can can overhear. I want to ask you something.” After entering this secure space, Netanyahu proceeded to ask, “So, did O. J. do it?” Dershowitz replied, “Mr. Prime Minister, does Israel have nuclear weapons?” to which Bibi responded, “Alan you know I can’t tell you that.” Said Dershowitz, “Aha! You know I can’t tell you that.”
E. Netanyahu is a huge fan of the Naked Gun trilogy of movies, and his favorite character is Officer Nordberg, who was played by O. J. Simpson. Nordberg’s claim to fame in these movies is that he always found himself in terrible and absurd situations where he sustained what should have been fatal injuries. For example, in the first film, Nordberg is shot multiple times and falls, banging his head on a pipe and burning his hand on a stove, eventually falling head first into a wedding cake and stepping into a bear trap. He goes on to suffer continued injuries and indignities while in intensive care, but recovers, only to suffer more injuries throughout that movie as well as Naked Gun 2 1/2 and Naked Gun 33 1/3. It is rumored that Netanyahu, whose own political career of frequently rising from the dead closely parallels that of Officer Nordberg, keeps a photo of O. J. Simpson in his private office.