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Here are the answers to Hy’s very last contest. How did you do?

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1 – A famous architect’s son invented a very popular children’s toy. Name the inventor and the toy. John Lloyd Wright, Lincoln Logs

2 – For 25 years the Sears Tower reigned supreme as the tallest in any land. Can you supply the answers to the following Sears/Willis Tower trivia questions?

• How many elevators and windows – 104 elevators, 16,100 windows
• How much rentable square feet – 3.8 million square feet
• Color of antenna on Mothers’ Day- Pink
• Three “highest” records Sears Tower still hold – Highest occupied floor, tallest antenna, tallest height to structural top

3 – What Chicago restaurant holds liquor license number 1? The Berghoff, 1933

4 – Art Institute Trivia

• Names of the two lions that guard the AI collection – On the Prowl (north), Attitude of Defiance (south)
• Architect who had his/her first office on the 3^rd floor of AIC – Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
• Site of art museum before present site – Michigan & Van Buren –  the Chicago Club

5 – What Civil War figure supervised the cutting of a channel to Lake Michigan through a sand bar at the mouth of the Chicago River? – Jefferson Davis and/or George McClellan

6 – Which architects said the following and what was the occasion?

• “I can’t help it Your Honor, I’m under oath” – When asked to identify himself at a trial, FLW responded, “I’m FLW, the world’s greatest architect.” The judge interjected that the statement was a bit presumptuous, to which FLW replied with the quote. 
• “Why did the men behind the Tribune throw away this priceless treasure?” – Uttered by the great Louis Sullivan in response to the Trib’s non-selection of Eliel Saarinen’s entry in the 1922 contest to design the Tribune Tower. 
• “Less is a bore.” – Response of architect Robert Venturi to Mies van der Rohe’s dictum, “Less is more.”
• “We don’t need a new architecture every Monday morning.” – Retort of Mies to criticism of the sameness of his International Style.

7 – What political figure took his flight training at the old Navy Pier? – Our 41st president, George Herbert Walker Bush

8 – What very famous artist’s grandfather played a role in very early Chicago history?  – James McNeil Whistler’s grandfather (not his mother’s), Captain John Whistler, built Fort Dearborn. 

9 – The following phrases are engraved on plaques on our tours. Can you locate them and describe what they commemorate?

• “…17,600 feet below…” – NW corner of LaSalle andMonroe. All heights in the city are referenced by this site.
• “…more than 800 people…” – NE corner of Wacker and LaSalle, Eastland Disaster
• “…Day of Two Noons.” – NE corner of LaSalle and Jackson. Established Standard Time in U.S. 
• “Conceived as part of Daniel Burnham’s 1900 [sic] Plan of Chicago… – NW corner of  the DuSable/Michigan Avenue Bridge

10 – One year, Chicagoans were allowed to write something on the top of their tax return to receive a filing extension. What was the year and reason they had to give to get the extension?  – 1992, the Great Chicago Flood, and the words were “Chicago Flood.”

11 – Chicago developer Miles Berger said “the architect’s work reflects not only his/her own creativity, but the intent and vision of the building’s developer” Who were the developers, without whom the following buildings would never have been created? –

• 55 W. Monroe nee Xerox Center – Marvin Romanek & Eugene Golub
• 200 S. Wacker and 190 S. LaSalle – John Buck
• Lake Point Tower – Charles Shaw
• 1818 W. Madison – Lee Miglin &  J. Paul Beitler
• 860-880 N. Lake Shore Drive – Herbert Greenwald

12 – When I was a young lad, women had wonderful names like Agnes, Gertrude, Minnie, Sophie, and ever-popular Zelda. Can you identify the following uniquely named women and the role they played in Chicago history and/or Chicago architecture?

• Bertha – Bertha  Honore Palmer, wife of Potter Palmer
• Mamah – Margaret ‘Mamah” Bothwick Cheney, mistress of FLW. Killed in 1914 by a crazed servant at Taliesin,  along with her two children. 
• Dila – Dila Kohn, daughter of Abraham Kohn, pioneer Chicago settler and one of e founders of KAM Temple, the first temple in Chicago; married Dankmar Adler in 1872. 
• Olgivanna – In 1928, Olgivanna Milanov Hinzenberg became the third wife of FLW. If she had shortened her first name, she would have been Vanna Wright.
• Eulalia – The first birth on record in Chicago was Eulalia Pointe DuSable, daughter of Jean Baptiste Pointe DuSable, and his Potawatomi Indian wife, Kitihawa, in 1796. 

13 – LAST QUESTION – THIS IS THE ONLY ONE IN OVER 20 YEARS OF HY’S TRIVIA THAT NO ONE ANSWERED CORRECTLY.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has placed the griffin on the endangered species list. The once-noble animal with head, beak and wings of an eagle on the body of a lion, has stood over our institutions for hundreds of years.

With the death of the last griffin at the Lincoln Park Zoo, the few remaining are endangered because of changes in architectural style and the wrecking ball.

At the behest of the Trivia Academy, CAF has undertaken the task of documenting the few remaining griffins. Please help us locate thee four once proud animals.

1.  Wrigley Building
2. 101 S. State Street (Kay Jewelers)
3. Londonhouse Hotel
4. Merv Griffin

Thank you, Hy, for challenging, entertaining and stumping us for the past 25 years!. And if you haven’t read Hy’s story in his own words,   CLICK HERE.