Q 01/05

Why was the dying Abraham Lincoln laid diagonally across a boardinghouse bed on the night he was shot?

A) He was too tall

B) To ease his breathing

C) To drain the wound

D) The frame was cracked

Answer · why

A) He was too tall

He was too tall for the small bed in the back bedroom, so Lincoln lay corner to corner through the night and died there the next morning.

Q 02/05

In which Roman tragedy by Shakespeare did John Wilkes Booth share a stage with his two actor brothers?

A) Titus Andronicus

B) Richard III

C) Julius Caesar

D) Coriolanus

Answer · why

C) Julius Caesar

Julius Caesar brought the three Booth brothers together just once, in November 1864, and John Wilkes played Mark Antony rather than one of the assassi...

Q 03/05

On which Christian holy day in April 1865 was Abraham Lincoln shot while watching a comedy?

A) Palm Sunday

B) Good Friday

C) Easter Sunday

D) Maundy Thursday

Answer · why

B) Good Friday

Good Friday gave the mourning a religious cast: Lincoln died the next morning, and Easter Sunday sermons a day later praised him from the pulpit.

Q 04/05

Which territory did the Secretary of State stabbed on the night Lincoln was shot later buy for the United States?

A) Hawaii

B) Greenland

C) Puerto Rico

D) Alaska

Answer · why

D) Alaska

Alaska cost the United States $7.2 million in 1867, a deal struck by a man who still carried the knife scars from that night.

Q 05/05

Which comedy by the English playwright Tom Taylor was Abraham Lincoln watching when he was shot?

A) Our American Cousin

B) She Stoops to Conquer

C) The School for Scandal

D) London Assurance

Answer · why

A) Our American Cousin

Our American Cousin was a farce about a rough-mannered Yankee claiming an English estate, and Booth knew it well enough to fire during a sure laugh.