50 Fun Facts About Atlas Shrugged

Which fashion retailer sells a clothing label named John Galt, after the hero of Atlas Shrugged?

Brandy Melville took the name because of its founder's libertarian ideals, and its stores are often decorated with signs bearing the character's name.

Which acclaimed 2007 video game by Ken Levine is widely considered a response to Atlas Shrugged?

BioShock shows a society that has collapsed under Rand's philosophy, and several of its leading characters take their names from her work.

In Atlas Shrugged, Dagny Taggart tracks down the vanished philosopher Hugh Akston doing which job?

Cooking in a diner suits Akston so well that Dagny, before she learns who he is, offers him a post running her dining cars. He turns her down.

In which TV drama's first season does the lead's boss urge him to read Atlas Shrugged?

Mad Men's Bert Cooper presses the book on Don Draper, and Don's later sales pitch to a client suggests the novel's strike plot has rubbed off on him.

In a 1991 Library of Congress survey of life-changing books, Atlas Shrugged ranked second behind which work?

The Bible came first among the Book-of-the-Month Club members who replied, with Rand's novel next and M. Scott Peck's The Road Less Traveled third.

In Atlas Shrugged, the pirate Ragnar Danneskjöld sees himself as the reverse of which folk hero?

Robin Hood, Ragnar argues, was twisted into a symbol of institutionalized looting. So Ragnar takes from the looters and returns the wealth to the people who produced it.

In Atlas Shrugged, Dagny Taggart spots a cigarette butt stamped with which symbol, the emblem of the strikers?

A dollar sign also stands three feet high over the strikers' hidden valley. When Rand died in 1982, her funeral included a six-foot floral one.

Which future Federal Reserve chairman belonged to the circle that heard Atlas Shrugged read aloud in draft?

Alan Greenspan was one of the young admirers who met at Rand's home, and he supplied her with information on the economics of the steel industry.

The first Atlas Shrugged film reached US cinemas in 2011 on a date pointedly chosen to mark which occasion?

Tax Day, April 15, was the politically symbolic date, and the film was promoted through Tea Party groups. Even so, it took under $5 million at the box office.

Atlas Shrugged's scientist Dr. Stadler was partly modeled on which physicist Rand had interviewed for a screenplay?

Robert Oppenheimer answered Rand's questions for a film about the atomic bomb that was never finished. She reused the research for Stadler and the state's secret weapon, Project X.

In Atlas Shrugged, what does the pirate Ragnar Danneskjöld hand Hank Rearden when the two men first meet?

A bar of gold is Ragnar's repayment for what the government took from Rearden over the years. He insists Rearden keep it for himself and the future, not put it into the mills.

Ayn Rand, the author of Atlas Shrugged, was born Alisa Rosenbaum in which country before emigrating in 1926?

Russia marked the book: Rand's family lost her father's pharmacy to nationalization after the revolution, and that experience shows in the ruined economy of her last novel.

Which 1943 novel about the architect Howard Roark made Ayn Rand famous before she wrote Atlas Shrugged?

The Fountainhead sold so well that publishers were asking about Rand's next novel before she had begun it, a sharp change from her earlier struggles to get into print.

John Galt's long speech in Atlas Shrugged sets out the philosophy that Ayn Rand went on to call what?

Objectivism, as Rand summed it up, treats man as a heroic being whose own happiness is the moral purpose of his life. Atlas Shrugged is its fullest statement in her fiction.

John Galt delivers a three-hour speech to the nation in Atlas Shrugged by hijacking which medium?

Radio gave Rand her hardest writing job: she spent more than two years on Galt's address, finishing it in October 1955, and progress on the novel slowed sharply meanwhile.

In Atlas Shrugged, Richard Halley vanishes the day after his greatest triumph; he is Dagny Taggart's favorite what?

Composer Halley saw his opera booed at its premiere and cheered 19 years later, then retired the next day. Dagny later hears a fifth concerto of his that the world does not know exists.

James Taggart, the president of Taggart Transcontinental in Atlas Shrugged, is what relation to Dagny Taggart?

Her brother holds the title while Dagny actually runs the trains. He opposes her at nearly every turn and ends the novel in a complete mental breakdown.

In Atlas Shrugged, Hank Rearden turns the very first pour of Rearden Metal into which gift for his wife?

A bracelet of the new alloy wins him only mockery at home: Lillian and the rest of his family treat the gift as one more proof of his selfishness.

Francisco d'Anconia of Atlas Shrugged inherits the world's largest mining business, which produces which metal?

Copper made the d'Anconias rich for generations, which is why Francisco's ruin of the firm baffles Dagny. He is wrecking it on purpose, to put it out of the looters' reach.

How does Dagny Taggart first arrive in the strikers' hidden valley, Galt's Gulch, in Atlas Shrugged?

In a plane crash: chasing an aircraft that is carrying off her engineer, Dagny flies through a screen of rays that hides the valley like a mirage, and comes down inside it.

Galt's Gulch, the hidden valley where the strikers of Atlas Shrugged gather, lies in the mountains of which state?

Colorado was Rand's choice after she and her husband passed through the mountain town of Ouray in 1951, while moving from Los Angeles to New York. She based the valley on it.

One legend told about John Galt in Atlas Shrugged claims that he went looking for which fabled lost place?

Atlantis is one of several tall tales Dagny hears before she meets the real man. Once she joins his cause, she learns that every one of the legends holds an element of truth.

Atlas Shrugged compares John Galt to which figure of Greek myth, imagined as taking his gift back from mankind?

Prometheus gave men fire and was punished for it. In the novel's retelling he changes his mind, breaks his chains and takes the fire away again, which is what Galt's strike amounts to.

The three parts of Atlas Shrugged are each named in honor of a law of logic set out by which Greek thinker?

Aristotle's laws of non-contradiction, excluded middle and identity give the three parts their titles. Rand also based the novel's wisest teacher, Hugh Akston, on him.

The abandoned motor that Dagny Taggart and Hank Rearden find in Atlas Shrugged was built to run on what?

Static electricity drawn from the air powers a motor that could have revolutionized the world, yet its inventor walked away and left it unfinished. Dagny hires Quentin Daniels to rebuild it.

In Atlas Shrugged, Project X turns Dr. Stadler's science into a weapon that destroys its targets with what?

Sound waves earn the weapon its nickname, the Xylophone. When Cuffy Meigs drunkenly overloads it, it wipes out everything within a hundred miles, Stadler included.

Which vessels does the pirate Ragnar Danneskjöld seize on the high seas throughout Atlas Shrugged?

Government relief ships carrying American aid to the People's States of Europe are his targets. He holds the proceeds for the strikers, so they will have capital to rebuild the world.

Which retired film star of Atlas Shrugged is secretly married to the pirate Ragnar Danneskjöld?

Kay Ludlow quit Hollywood over the roles she was given, and the outside world knows her only as a vanished actress. The marriage is kept hidden from everyone beyond Galt's Gulch.

Rand named Atlas Shrugged's Ragnar Danneskjöld in tribute to Hans of Iceland, a novel by which French author?

Victor Hugo was one of Rand's favorite writers from her schooldays, and the hero of his Hans of Iceland becomes the first Count of Danneskjöld. She explained the borrowing at a 1974 lecture.

Which oil man in Atlas Shrugged sets his own wells on fire and vanishes rather than hand them to the government?

Ellis Wyatt leaves a note telling the looters the fields are theirs, just as he found them. One blazing well that resists every effort to put it out becomes known as Wyatt's Torch.

Which vanished banker in Atlas Shrugged is the legal owner of the land where Galt's Gulch stands?

Midas Mulligan closed his bank and paid off every depositor after a court ordered him to lend to an incompetent applicant. The nickname began as a newspaper's insult; he made it his legal name.

Which assistant to Dagny Taggart unknowingly feeds John Galt information over cafeteria meals in Atlas Shrugged?

Eddie Willers confides in a nameless workman he likes, never suspecting who the man is. The novel prints only Eddie's half of their conversations.

Which lobbyist in Atlas Shrugged betrays Hank Rearden and rises to become the country's economic dictator?

Wesley Mouch meets every failure of his own policies the same way: he says he cannot help it and asks for wider powers. Selling out Rearden won him a senior post at the Bureau of Economic Planning.

Which dime-store shopgirl in Atlas Shrugged marries James Taggart, believing he is the hero behind the railroad?

Cherryl Brooks learns from the railroad's own employees that Dagny, not her husband, is the kind of person she had admired. Seeing what Jim really is, and no way out, destroys her.

In Atlas Shrugged, which country nationalizes Francisco d'Anconia's San Sebastián mines, only to find them empty?

Mexico seizes the mines and the Taggart rail line built to serve them, then discovers there is no ore. Francisco had drawn his investors into the scheme knowing how it would end.

The heirs of Atlas Shrugged's Twentieth Century Motor Company ruin it by paying every worker according to what?

Their need set the pay and their ability set the workload, so within months everyone was hiding his skill and pleading hardship. Production plummeted until the factory went bankrupt.

Francisco d'Anconia's famous wedding-party speech in Atlas Shrugged defends what against the charge of being evil?

Money, Francisco tells James Taggart's guests, is a symbol of achievement, free trade and justice. He admits afterwards that the speech was aimed at Hank Rearden, to arm him morally.

What false public image does Francisco d'Anconia cultivate in Atlas Shrugged to hide his part in the strike?

A reckless playboy is how the newspapers paint him, to the dismay of Dagny, who had loved the creative genius he once was. Behind the act he is deliberately destroying his own company.

When Project X destroys itself in Atlas Shrugged, it brings down the Taggart Bridge, the last crossing of which river?

Mississippi bridges had been closing one by one as the economy decayed, leaving the Taggart Bridge as the only link left. Half of it falls into the water with a train on it.

Which government order in Atlas Shrugged freezes every job in place and forces inventors to sign away their patents?

Directive 10-289 drives Dagny to resign in protest. Rearden signs his metal away under it only because officials threaten to make his affair with her public.

Which man in Ayn Rand's life suggested the title Atlas Shrugged, until then the name of a single chapter?

Frank O'Connor, Rand's husband, offered the chapter title after she decided her working title, The Strike, gave away the novel's central riddle too early.

Which publisher, led by Bennett Cerf, brought out Atlas Shrugged in 1957 after Bobbs-Merrill turned it down?

Random House won Rand over when Cerf read part of the manuscript and declared it a great book. It was the first time a publisher's executives had seemed enthusiastic about her work.

Whittaker Chambers wrote the most notorious critique of Atlas Shrugged in 1957 for which conservative magazine?

National Review printed Chambers's verdict that the book hardly deserved to be called a novel at all. William F. Buckley Jr. and its other writers kept up the attack on Rand for years.

Which Republican congressman said Ayn Rand was why he entered public service and made his staff read Atlas Shrugged?

Paul Ryan made the remark in 2005, then backed away from it in 2012, calling his supposed devotion to Rand an urban legend.

Which actress played Dagny Taggart in Atlas Shrugged: Part I, two years before starring in Orange Is the New Black?

Taylor Schilling played opposite Grant Bowler's Hank Rearden. Their director, Paul Johansson, also appears in the film as John Galt, briefly and in shadow.

What did the makers of the Atlas Shrugged film trilogy replace between each of its three installments?

The entire cast changed twice, because the first film's actors had not been contracted for the whole trilogy. Three actresses play Dagny Taggart and three men play John Galt.

Which actor, a sitcom dad on Good Luck Charlie, played the pirate Ragnar Danneskjöld in Atlas Shrugged Part III?

Eric Allan Kramer had practice at playing Nordic strongmen: in a 1988 television film he became the first actor to play Marvel's Thor in live action.

Atlas Shrugged was a 1958 National Book Award finalist but lost to The Wapshot Chronicle by which author?

John Cheever won with his debut novel, about an eccentric Massachusetts family. Rand's book was honored only in 1983, with a Hall of Fame award for libertarian science fiction.

Rand's notes say Mr. Thompson, Atlas Shrugged's undistinguished Head of the State, was modeled on which president?

Harry S. Truman was in the White House when Rand began the book. She would not call her character President, feeling the title carried honorable connotations he did not deserve.

Which Supreme Court justice named Atlas Shrugged in 2006 as one of his favorite novels?

Clarence Thomas was one of several conservatives to warm to a book their movement's leading magazine had once attacked. Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh later praised it on air.