No trivial matter
WAYNESBURG – Those who think they have an abundance of trivial information floating in their heads have a shot at turning that random knowledge into cash.
Greene County Historical Society is seeking four-to-eight-member teams to compete in its second annual Brain Buster Trivia Challenge Friday. The first-place team will walk away with $500 and a traveling trophy. Second- and third-place teams win $250 and $125, respectively.
“A lot of it has to do with feeling trust in your team members. With six or seven people on a team, and having to make a quick decision takes good interpersonal skills, intuition, listening to that inner voice, to decide whose answer to go with,” said Mark McCurdy of the defending champion team.
McCurdy said the competition is good exercise for the brain and a chance to help support the efforts of the historical society.
“It helps to have a team member like Jim Caruso. He is our Babe Ruth,” McCurdy said. “The more diverse the backgrounds (of team members), the better when you are asked things like Honus Wagner’s mother’s maiden name or whatever. You don’t even know why you know such things, and there it is.”
Wayne Hart, creator and emcee of the event, has made some minor changes to the format of the competition. The biggest change will be a go-for-broke jeopardy bonus question at the end of regular play. There will be 25 questions, followed by a break, and then a second round of 25 questions with varying point values assigned per question. At the end of the game, teams will determine how many of their points they are willing to wager on that final jeopardy question.
Hart said it is anyone’s game right up to that point. A team with 25 points could wager it all, answer correctly, and pull ahead for the win if a leading team bids too cautiously.
“I based changes on the feedback we received last year,” Hart said. “I broadened the spectrum of questions to attract a wider pool of competitors, moved it to a Friday evening and made the majority of the questions multiple-choice with a few single word answers thrown in.”
There wasn’t a standout easy or hard category for the first trivia challenge, but there was a topic that people weren’t fond of, he said.
“The one they liked the least was phobias. I replaced it with advertisements. The college nicknames category is gone, replaced with board games,” Hart said. Other topics include television, music, sports, world geography, U.S. history, the Bible, U.S. states and potpourri.
With just days left to enter, McCurdy is throwing down the gauntlet to his fellow educators, trivia buffs and others who want the bragging right of the traveling Thinker trophy. Four more teams must register for the event to be held.
“The overarching benefit is to the charities all of these trivia competitions in the area support,” McCurdy said, noting a recent competition held by the Washington Rotary Club.
The cost to enter is $25 per team member. Spectators are charged $10. Pizza, snacks, and beverages are included in the cost to participate or watch.
Doors will open at 5 p.m. with the competition starting promptly at 6 p.m. in building 9 at the Greene County Fairgrounds.