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Back by popular demand
With all the talk circulating in the media about a proposed high school exit exam, we got to wondering if the testing mania will go so far as to eventually require residents of a county to pass an exam to see if they qualify to live there.
If so, we've got Jackson County's quiz ready.
It was inspired back in 1999 by a book published that year by The University of North Carolina Press – "The Ultimate North Carolina Quiz Book."
Back when we first got the book, we spent days questioning each other during lunch at the Cafe, and, while we mostly come up with wrong answers (except for Carey Phillips), we had a lot of fun. We'll review some of the highlights of that volume before getting down to the business of testing readers' knowledge of local lore.
Written by journalist Lew Powell, reporter and editor at the Charlotte Observer, the book is full of fascinating facts that we still haven't found in history books.
Quite a few questions are about the state's most famous sheriff – Andy Taylor – who was portrayed by native son Andy Griffith. One Mayberry-related query we didn't know asked 1) On what television show was the Sheriff Taylor character introduced? Another one we knew was 2) Although he was best known for his television series, Griffith won applause from movie critics for his role in what 1957 drama: "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn," "Come Back, Little Sheba," "The Three Faces of Eve," or "A Face in the Crowd?"
Powell's book is organized in a user-friendly format. Each chapter is followed by an answer section that makes it fun to test yourself and others – and easy to look up the answer when you're completely baffled.
The author groups his questions in such categories as Arts and Letters, Commerce and Science, Culture, Music and Entertainment and Sports and Recreation. We'll reconfigure those slightly for the mini-quiz, using only questions that have been thoroughly tested by Herald staffers. We'll use Powell's questions, but we'll classify them differently: Amazing Stuff One of Us Knew; Sports Questions That Even Stumped Carey Phillips; Local Interest (questions about Jackson and nearby counties); and Other (for the 1.25 questions I happened to know).
I Googled Powell's "Ultimate North Carolina Quiz Book" this morning, and it's apparently still available from The University of North Carolina Press.
To test your knowledge of the Old North State, try these:
3) The government said the purpose of Fontana Dam, opened in Western North Carolina in 1945, was to provide electricity to make aluminum. In reality, however, who was its main beneficiary?
4) The so-called "horn-tootin' bill" passed by the 1943 Legislature gave the state what national first?
Moving on to sports, here are two that even Carey didn't know:
5) What North Carolina town is named for a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame?
6) The first player ever cut from the Carolina Panthers roster went on to achieve top billing in another arena. Who is he?
And, to be fair, here's the one Carey Phillips amazed us all by answering correctly:
7) Why did the N.C. General Assembly declare Easter Monday a state holiday in 1935? And why did it change the holiday to good Friday in 1987?
Moving on to Local Interest:
8) What three North Carolina counties are named for presidents?
9) What is Swain County's "road to nowhere?"
Moving on to my category, Other, I knew one-fourth of one question because it has my favorite singer, Emmylou Harris, and all of another because I'm from Georgia:
10) Match the entertainer with the college he or she attended: John Tesh, Carroll O'Connor, Emmylou Harris, Jack Palance/North Carolina State University, UNC-Greensboro, Wake Forest University, UNC-Chapel Hill.
11) Which of these is not a community in North Carolina: Lizard Lick, Loafers Glory, Possum Trot, Pumpkin Center, Social Circle?
Now that you've gotten the hang of it, here's our proposed Jackson County-qualifying test:
1) True or false: The highest point along the Blue Ridge Parkway is in Jackson County.
2) How many perfect records (regular and post-season) have been achieved by Sylva-Webster or Smoky Mountain in football?
3) What do former Cherokee Chief Joyce Dugan, Kay Yow, Carolyn Hunt, Elizabeth Dole and Maya Angelou have in common?
4) How many Jackson County players have ever been a part of an Atlantic Coast Conference championship basketball team?
5) Match each of these Jackson County newsmakers with the community where he was raised: Department of Transportation board member Conrad Burrell, former county Manager Jay Denton, Commissioners' Chairman Stacy Buchanan, former Clerk of Court Frank Watson/Savannah, Speedwell, Foster Siding, East LaPorte.
6) What former Major League Baseball manager was born in Jackson County?
SCROLL DOWN FOR ANSWERS
1. The Danny Thomas Show. In a 1960 episode, Sheriff Taylor (Andy Griffith) arrested nightclub performer Thomas for speeding through his sleepy town.
2. "A Face in the Crowd."
3. The Manhattan Project at Oak Ridge, Tenn. The super-secret project produced highly enriched uranium for the atomic bomb that exploded over Hiroshima eight months after the dam opened.
4. First state to provide continuing financial support for an orchestra – the North Carolina Symphony.
5. Landis, in Rowan County. In 1907 Kennesaw Mountain Landis, a federal judge in Illinois, made headlines by fining Standard Oil $29 million for monopolistic trade practices, after which the fledgling town named itself after him. In 1920, in the wake of the Black Sox scandal, Landis was chosen the first commissioner of baseball.
6. Journeyman tackle Bill Goldberg, who found fame as simply "Goldberg" in World Championship Wrestling.
7. It designated Easter Monday to accommodate state employees who wanted to attend the annual baseball game between cross-county rivals N.C. State and Wake Forest (then actually located in the town of Wake Forest). It switched to Good Friday to accommodate banks, which had complained about being out of step with the rest of the nation.
8. Jackson, Washington, Madison. Cleveland, Lincoln, Polk and Wilson are not.
9. A road promised by the federal government in 1943 but still unbuilt today. At the height of World War II, the government took land from Swain County for a 10,000-acre lake. (Today Fontana Dam, the highest in the eastern U.S., produces electricity for the Tennessee Valley Authority.) Federal officials agreed in writing to provide the ousted residents access to family cemeteries, but the planned 34-mile road was never finished, and later the area was incorporated, over intense local objections, into Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
10. John Tesh, N.C. State; Carroll O'Connor, Wake Forest; Emmylou Harris, UNC-Greensboro; Jack Palance, UNC-Chapel Hill.
11. Social Circle is in Georgia.
1. True. Richland Balsam, the highest point along the Parkway, is in eastern Jackson County.
2. One. The 1973 Sylva-Webster Golden Eagles, coached by Babe Howell with the assistance of Boyce Deitz and Dennis Proffitt, were state champs with a 14-0 record.
3. All are recipients of the N.C. Council for Women's Distinguished Women of North Carolina Awards.
4. One. Angie Salyer of Clemson, in 1996.
5. Conrad Burrell, East LaPorte; Jay Denton, Foster Siding; Stacy Buchanan, Savannah; Frank Watson, Speedwell.
6. The late Johnny Oates, who managed the Rangers and Orioles.
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