40 Fun Facts About From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

What did the Met pay at auction for the marble angel Claudia Kincaid suspects is a lost masterpiece?

$225 was all the museum paid for a statue that could be a priceless Michelangelo, and Mrs. Frankweiler let it go for that sum on purpose. Her bargain sale is what sets the whole mystery in motion.

Where do Claudia and Jamie Kincaid hide at closing time while guards sweep the Met for stragglers?

The restrooms hide the pair each evening: they wait in the booths until the guards' closing check is over, then step out into a dark and empty museum.

What becomes extra income for Claudia and Jamie Kincaid once they are living in the Met?

Wishing coins in the Met's restaurant fountain turn the runaways' cold bath into payday: Jamie feels bumps on the bottom, and the pair scoop up all their hands can hold.

How do Claudia and Jamie Kincaid avoid standing out among the Met's daytime visitors?

Joining school tour groups keeps their faces part of a crowd, so no guard wonders why two children are alone on a weekday. They even pick a class to sit beside at lunch in the snack bar.

Mrs. Frankweiler's confidant Saxonberg turns out to be what relation to runaways Claudia and Jamie?

Their grandfather is the twist of the last page, and the Kincaids themselves never learn it. Mrs. Frankweiler keeps that knowledge to herself and advises Saxonberg, for his own good, not to tell them.

In the novel, how does Mrs. Frankweiler send the Kincaid runaways home from her estate?

In her Rolls-Royce, driven by her chauffeur, the two ride home as her half of a bargain: a lift in exchange for every detail of their week away. Jamie spends the trip pushing every button in the back seat.

In which Connecticut town do the Kincaids live, where Claudia feels unappreciated for her chores?

Greenwich sends hundreds of commuters into New York by train each day, which is how Claudia comes to pick the city: elegant, busy and, to her mind, the best place in the world to hide.

The whole of Mixed-Up Files is framed as a letter from Mrs. Frankweiler to whom?

Her lawyer is the addressee: the prologue is a cover letter explaining why her last will and testament is about to change, and the runaways' story that follows is her evidence.

What double did Konigsburg pull off at the 1968 Newbery awards that no other author has matched?

Winner plus runner-up: Mixed-Up Files took the Medal while Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William McKinley, and Me, Elizabeth was a runner-up. That book grew out of her daughter's time as the newcomer in their apartment house.

How do Claudia and Jamie Kincaid tell the Met about their clue?

A typed letter does it: Claudia uses a typewriter left out for passers-by on Fifth Avenue, so there is no handwriting to disguise, and the pair rent a post office box for the museum's reply.

What does Claudia Kincaid tuck inside a Roman marble sarcophagus while living at the Met?

Her violin case goes into the sarcophagus, while Jamie's trumpet case gets stuffed into a big decorative urn. Museum guards found both abandoned cases after the children had gone home.

Which habit of Claudia Kincaid's keeps starting arguments with Jamie?

Correcting his grammar is her reflex, until Jamie tells her to stop ending every discussion with an argument about it. The same quarrel cracks the case: his 'boloney' reminds her to look under Bologna.

Where in Connecticut is Mrs. Frankweiler's country estate, the runaways' last stop before home?

Farmington holds her country estate and its long wall of filing cabinets. The runaways spend the last of their money getting there once the museum's answer shows they have been naive.

Which New York Public Library branch do the Kincaid runaways use to research the angel away from the Met?

Donnell, on 53rd Street opposite the Museum of Modern Art, is where a librarian at the 42nd Street library sends the pair for books on Michelangelo. It closed in 2008 and was rebuilt beneath a hotel tower.

How does Claudia Kincaid get the runaways most of the way to New York without paying?

A discarded adult train pass, fished from a wastebasket at home, still has one ride left, and one adult fare carries two children at half price. From the station to the Met they walk, on Jamie's orders.

What must Claudia and Jamie Kincaid do to inherit Mrs. Frankweiler's proof of who carved the angel?

Tell no one while she lives: in return she will leave the crucial file to them in her will, once they have told her every detail of their week away. She gets the whole account on tape before sending them home.

According to Mrs. Frankweiler, what did Claudia Kincaid really want from the angel search?

A secret of her own to treasure and keep is what she was after all along, not a headline. Mrs. Frankweiler hands her one and hopes the pair will keep coming back to visit.

Besides being the eldest, what sets Claudia apart among the four Kincaid children?

The only girl, which by her reckoning is why she must both set the table and empty the dishwasher while her three brothers get out of everything. That injustice starts her planning.

Which card game does Jamie Kincaid cheat at, playing for cash with his best friend on the bus every day?

War is the game, and the two boys vow never to shuffle, banding each day's stacks and spitting on them to seal it. Jamie collects from Bruce every Friday and later admits to Mrs. Frankweiler that he cheats.

How big is nine-year-old Jamie Kincaid's bankroll when he and Claudia set out for the Met?

$24.43 is the whole bankroll, mostly pennies and nickels, so heavy that it drags his trousers down as they leave. Konigsburg said one reader scolded her for claiming two children could last a week on it.

Which national park picnic, with whining kids and ants, gave Konigsburg the idea for Mixed-Up Files?

Yellowstone, where the chocolate milk warmed, ants got on everything and the sun melted the cupcake icing, convinced her that her children would never run away to anywhere less elegant than the Met.

The real 1965 bargain statue behind the Mixed-Up Files mystery was debated as a possible work by which artist?

Leonardo da Vinci, not Michelangelo, was the name attached to the plaster bust the Met bought for a pittance in 1965. The museum now lists it as after Andrea del Verrocchio, and Konigsburg's angel is her own invention.

Who posed for Konigsburg's own black-and-white illustrations of Claudia and Jamie in Mixed-Up Files?

Her two younger children posed: Laurie was Claudia and Ross was Jamie, while a neighbour she stopped in the elevator of their Port Chester apartment house sat for Mrs. Frankweiler.

Mrs. Frankweiler was modelled on a headmistress Konigsburg taught under after earning a degree in which science?

Chemistry was her degree; she then taught science at a Florida girls' school whose matter-of-fact headmistress, Olga Pratt, became the model for the collector. There she found her students' heads more interesting than her test tubes.

Konigsburg graduated with honors in 1952 from which Pittsburgh university?

Carnegie Mellon, then the Carnegie Institute of Technology, came after a year keeping the books at a wholesale meat plant to save for it. The owner's brother who dropped by the office became her husband.

In which Florida city, her longtime home, did Konigsburg teach at a girls' school before turning to writing?

Jacksonville drew the couple south once her husband had his doctorate, and she taught at a private girls' school there before her children were born. After the New York years she settled back on the coast nearby.

Which gadget, his one big purchase, does thrifty Jamie Kincaid bring along when the pair run away?

A transistor radio from Woolworth's was the one big purchase Jamie had ever made, and Claudia thought they would probably need it. It ends up in the Met's Lost and Found, left behind with his underwear.

Which New York school did Konigsburg join for weekend lessons after the family moved to Port Chester in 1962?

The Art Students League filled her weekend mornings, and she spent the afternoons exploring the city with her children, often at the Metropolitan Museum, the outings that later gave her runaways their hideout.

Which Konigsburg novel about a sixth-grade Academic Bowl team won her second Newbery Medal?

The View from Saturday began as separate short stories in her files; on a walk along the beach she saw that they belonged together, and each became the tale of one member of the quiz team.

Konigsburg was born in New York City in 1930 but grew up in small towns of which state?

Pennsylvania mill towns raised her: she was valedictorian of her high school in Farrell, which had no guidance counsellors, and had to work out for herself how to get to college.

Which actress, holder of three Oscars, played Mrs. Frankweiler in the 1973 film of Mixed-Up Files?

Ingrid Bergman's turn as the collector was her first screen role in three years. When the film was recut for a re-release, the opening was trimmed so that she appears sooner.

Under what new title was the 1973 Mixed-Up Files film re-released and later sold on home video?

The Hideaways was the name Bing Crosby Productions gave the film for a 1974 re-release, after it had flopped outside New York and been pulled from distribution.

Which screen legend who debuted in the 1940s played Mrs. Frankweiler in the 1995 television film of Mixed-Up Files?

Lauren Bacall played the collector in the 1995 television remake, which gave Jamie a cold and had Claudia pose as an adult to get a museum appointment, two twists the novel never had.

The 1973 film of Mixed-Up Files moved the story's suburban scenes from Connecticut to which state?

New Jersey took Connecticut's place: the film makes Mrs. Frankweiler a reclusive New Jersey heiress, and the runaways buy train tickets there instead of going home once the museum's answer lets them down.

Which Mel Brooks comedy regular plays the schoolteacher in the 1973 Mixed-Up Files film?

Madeline Kahn has a special-appearance credit as the schoolteacher, made the same year as Paper Moon. The Met had refused a jewel-heist film shortly before, but let this production shoot inside.

The 1973 Mixed-Up Files film changes Saxonberg's job, making him Mrs. Frankweiler's what?

Butler is the film's role for Saxonberg, played by George Rose. The children's visit changes his employer: the story ends with the reclusive widow ordering him to open up the house again.

What clue do the Kincaid runaways find pressed into the cloth the angel stood on?

A stonemason's mark cut into the statue's base had left its print in the velvet. The triumph is brief: the Met's answer is that it has long known of the mark, which is still its strongest lead.

In the 1995 Mixed-Up Files film, what in Mrs. Frankweiler's files finally proves Michelangelo carved the angel?

A sketch from his notebook, showing the angel itself, sits in the one file that matters, and the children get a single hour to find it among a roomful of cabinets.

Which future Chicago P.D. star played Jamie Kincaid in the 1995 Mixed-Up Files television film?

Jesse Lee Soffer, later Detective Jay Halstead on Chicago P.D. for nearly a decade, was the young runaway-turned-sleuth in the ABC remake. He has since returned to the police drama as a director.

Which Met benefactor's antique state bed do Claudia and Jamie Kincaid sleep in each night of their stay?

Irwin Untermyer, a New York judge and longtime Met trustee, is named by Mrs. Frankweiler as the bed's donor. She says she was relieved he gave it: she could keep her own sixteenth-century bed without feeling guilty.