Q 01/05

The word 'salary' traces back to the Latin name of which seasoning, also the root of 'salad' and 'sausage'?

A) Pepper

B) Salt

C) Garlic

D) Vinegar

Answer · why

B) Salt

Salt gave Latin 'salarium', the pay of Roman soldiers, though the popular claim that legions were paid in the stuff itself is baseless.

Q 02/05

Which country star clacked her acrylic fingernails to make the typewriter beat of the office anthem '9 to 5'?

A) Loretta Lynn

B) Tammy Wynette

C) Dolly Parton

D) Reba McEntire

Answer · why

C) Dolly Parton

Dolly Parton earned an Oscar nomination for '9 to 5', the title song of the 1980 comedy that gave her a first film role beside Jane Fonda and Lily Tom...

Q 03/05

Which company sells the Post-it Note, born when an employee wanted a bookmark that would stay put in his hymn book?

A) 3M

B) IBM

C) Kodak

D) DuPont

Answer · why

A) 3M

3M chemist Spencer Silver had made the weak glue by accident, and colleague Arthur Fry found its use in 1974. The yellow came by chance: it was the on...

Q 04/05

Which symbol of American women in wartime factories began as a 1942 song by Redd Evans and John Jacob Loeb?

A) Wendy the Welder

B) Josephine the Plumber

C) Winnie the Welder

D) Rosie the Riveter

Answer · why

D) Rosie the Riveter

Rosie the Riveter was a hit song first. The famous 'We Can Do It!' poster, made for Westinghouse, was never called by that name during the war.

Q 05/05

Casual Friday grew out of a 1960s campaign by garment makers to get printed shirts into offices in which U.S. state?

A) California

B) Hawaii

C) Florida

D) Arizona

Answer · why

B) Hawaii

Hawaii's shirt makers gave two aloha shirts to every state legislator, then won 'Aloha Friday' in 1966. The habit spread east through California and a...