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

Hi,

A friend of mine has an extremely obscure trivia quiz of 50 questions. I have found nearly all the answers, but the final few are killing me. Nowhere on the net can I find an answer, and even phone calls to 'authorities' have drawn blanks. Can anyone help me? Here are the questions:

(1) What increased in diameter by 2mm on 10 October this year?

(2) Whose cat phobia ked to the execution of about 30,000 cats?
- I have a list of famous ailuphobes, but none has come up trumps yet.
- The other possibility is 'The Catholic Church in the middle ages - The killed cats fearing them as evil
Anybody got a definitive answer?

(3) Who is the only British athlete to win a gymnastics medal at the Olympics?
- The BAGA told me the name 'Arthur Whitfield', but the IOC claim Britain has never won a gymnastics medal
- Maybe it was a Brit who competed for another country?

(4) What is a triangle of toast used as a garnish called?
- Everyone says Melba, but nowhere can I find anything that says Melba has to be triangular.

(5) Jeremiah Lagden of Little Abington plied his trade on Newmarket Road (Camb). What was his profession?
- All I've found is a deed to some land ownder by a Jeremiah Lagden.

(6) "He is for the gallows in this world and the fires of hell in the next" were reputedly the words of the midwife. To whom was she referring?
- I know I've heard this, but can't recall the source. Lots of guesses, no hard facts.

Thanks to anyone who can help!

Dave P

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Sorry, Dave P, I don't know the definitive answers to any of those questions, but I would love to know what the other 44 questions are....

Oh, B***er double posting, they keep happening to me today!!

(1) What increased in diameter by 2mm on 10 October this year?
I think this was a coin...Does the £1 coin sound likely?

The Newmarket Road is very long in Cambridge. Maybe he cut the grass at the football grounds

1) I'm going for the big picture with this one and guessing either the sun or the universe.

2) Looking beyond the Catholic Church, I'm guessing the fear of witches/witchcraft.

4) Melba is a strange term in cooking. Peach Melba refers to the combination of peaches and raspberries. Melba toast is flat, crustless toast. I doubt it's the single term for this hors d'oeuvre.

6) Oliver Cromwell? Robespierre? Torquemada?

As I am sure you all know, both Melba toast and Peach Melba were named after the famous Australian opera singer, Dame Nellie Melba (the great aunt of a friend of mine), who was reputed to have had an 'interesting' way of toning up her vocal chords before a concert - I'll leave it to your imagination!!

On page 38 of 'The Complete Cookbook' by Katie Stewart it says:
".....Cut each half diagonally into a triangles and toast the untoasted sides. The Melba toast will curl up and become crisp"

I can't imagine a British coin ever getting bigger, surely they only ever get smaller. Would it be something to do with pipes, to bring them into line with the EU and metrification? - It's only a guess.

I think the Catholic who killed the cats was probably my husband - he hates cat (and I have two of them) - they hate him equally, I'm sure it' because he kicks them when I'm not looking.

1, 3, & 5 --absolutely no idea.
2. I keep coming back to a French Revolution figure. I want to say Rabelais, or Robispierre. I do know it was during that time in France, anyway.
6. My guess would be Adolf Hitler.
and number 4. definitively. got it staight out of Julia Child's baking cookbook. It is called a "point" of toast.
And yes, I would *love* to see the other 44 questions. You could post them, yes? It would be fun.

On number 5, my Massachussetts born and bred husband says Johnny Appleseed...and for some reason, it sounds right.

Was the Newmarket Road chap a highwayman?

I'd guess Mussolini for the person who hated cats. I know he hated them and I know that there are many wild (feral) cats in Rome. I don't have any evidence.

Johnny Appleseed's real name was John Chapman, so it's not him.

Ooh - didn't tennis balls get bigger to slow down serves recently?

And was the gallows chap Henry the whatsit who was shortened by Cromwell? The quote certainly features in the film version of those events....I think.

Do you mean Charles I, who walked and talked half an hour after his head was cut off?

Yes him. The Guardian's current campaign to get rid of the monarchy has missed the most important reason...so that we can learn some decent history!
So - Henry I it is then

I'll be posting all the questions later today. It's going to take time to type them all in!

The Royal Mint has no mention of coin sizes changing this year. It was my first thought. The nature of the quiz is that if you think you know the answer, you're probably wrong.

I think, given the date of Lagden (1871) we're probably talking of a time before municipal mowing was instituted.