h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Why would someone set up twelve cameras in a row???

What was the object of it??

As a result...(Clue here) someone won a bet!!!

Who were the protagonists??

What was the bet about??

Who was the man that provided the proof???

(Extra points for his real and assumed names!!)

No Google or Wiki, of course....

Many traps there are!!!



GT

Are there any animals involved?

Isn't Man an animal?????


GT


(Not being obtuse????)
GT

"Why would someone set up twelve cameras in a row???"

Because if they are attached to trip wires and a horse and rider set off the cameras you obtain images how horses anatomy works in motion, answering the question of whether all their feet are off the ground at a gallop.

"What was the object of it??"

To resolve a bet.

"As a result...(Clue here) someone won a bet!!!"

That's big clue.

"Who were the protagonists??"

Grr, two American dudes.

"What was the bet about??"

If at a gallop a horse's stride involves them losing all contact with the ground.

"Who was the man that provided the proof???
(Extra points for his real and assumed names!!)"

An American dude, who killed his wife in what was described as 'justifiable homicide'. Grr... Can't remember his name.


"No Google or Wiki, of course....

Many traps there are!!!"

OK, so how many traps did I fall into?

Well, well, well!

That is amazing!! Although some aspects are unresolved!

Yes, the cameras were set off by tripwires, (+3)

And it answered the question as to if all the horses feet were off the ground at the same time. (+3)

So we are left with the 'Whos'



GT

I still can't recall the names.
My memory/recall sucks... I'll try for some QI points:


I guessing I'd have some already if it was his wife he killed, so I'm switching to him having killed his wife's lover and being acquitted for that.

He used the principle behind zoetropes, of spinning discs creating the optical illusion of movement, so that you could project a moving image. Called something like a "zoescope"?

One of the guys in the bet was a famous racehorse/racetrack owner.

Hey I knew this one! I mean really ! I think the man who did the photography was called Muybridge?

That's the Edward Muybridge!

Well that's who I was going for too, alas sleep took me away before I got my answer!

There are still other folk to name and he apparently has alternate names. None of which I'm gonna remember without clues or cheats.

Wasn't it something to do the Stanford, who was governor of California and gave his name to the eponymous uni?

I know that he spelt his first name "Eadweard", but I can't add anything more.

Carrying on!!

Post 6 Jack Winterbourne - It was actually a zoopraxiscope, but I know trhe way you were thinking, so +3

And yes, one of the protagonists had an interest in horseracing, other than just betting on the outcome of races.

Post 7 pebbledrook - Yes, Muybridge is the name the photographer was known as, having changed it from......What?? Still +3 to you!

Post 8 Jack Winterburn - Edward was his birth name, but he changed it!!!

Post 11 Pedro - Yes, Stanford was indeed Governor of California!! He lost the bet!!

Post 12 hygenicdispenser - He changed his birth name to a more interesting Eadweard!! +3





GT

Just to make sure that the thread doesn't end on the thirteenth post, I knew about the photography to capture horses' legs/galloping &c. but I never knew it was for a bet and who was involved.

Previous to photographic evidence, they decided on how many hooves touched the ground by conducting a gallup poll.

Van

At the University which Stanford founded, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, destroyed amongst a whole bunch of other stuff, a stone shelf support a statue of Louis Agassiz (who proposed that Earth underwent a phenomenon known as an "Ice Age" occasionally.)

And this was the result.

http://quake06.stanford.edu/centennial/gallery/structures/quad/images/A025_v1_agassiz2.jpg

Apparently the only damaged sustained was a scratch to his nose.

I had this in my file of "interesting stuff" that I make my QIs out of, but since we're on the subject...

And while we aren't talking about how everything can be linked we can see that Edward links both Muybridge (his given first name) and the direction into the earth that the statue took. (Headward) Boom boom.

Never knew that Clive!!

Have a shiny +6!!!



GT

Any more takers on this one????

If not, I will close down and score it incompleted!!



GT

Gt, what are we still trying to work out here?

We are looking for the man who won the bet!!!!


GT