History Fact Finder

Literacy

1. When did artwork begin? [answer]
2. When did people begin to write? [answer]
3. When was the first alphabet created? [answer]
4. Who invented paper? [answer]
5. How old is the oldest illuminated manuscript? [answer]
6. What was the first book? [answer]
7. Why is Johannes Gutenberg considered the pioneer of modern printing? [answer]
8. When was the first newspaper published? [answer]
9. What is muckraking journalism? [answer]

Education

1. When were the first schools established? [answer]
2. How old is the idea of public schools? [answer]
3. When did the first kindergarten open? [answer]
4. Who was Maria Montessori? [answer]
5. How has the separation of church and state affected public schools in the United States? [answer]
6. When were schools in the United States desegregated? [answer]
7. When did higher education begin? [answer]
8. When was the first university founded in Europe? [answer]
9. What was the first university in the Americas? [answer]

Literature

1. How old are Aesop's fables? [answer]
2. Who were the Brothers Grimm? [answer]
3. What is known about Homer? [answer]
4. Is Virgil's Aeneid really an unfinished work? [answer]
5. Why is Beowulf considered an important work? [answer]
6. Why is The Divine Comedy such an important work, and what role does the character Beatrice play? [answer]
7. What is the importance of Canterbury Tales? [answer]
8. Why is Shakespeare still so widely studied? [answer]
9. What was William Shakespeare's formal education? [answer]
10. What is a poet laureate? [answer]
11. What does the term Machiavellian mean? [answer]
12. What were John Milton's contributions to English literature? [answer]
13. Why was Voltaire exiled from France? [answer]
14. What did Johann Goethe contribute to world literature? [answer]
15. How did a Frenchman become an influential observer of early American democracy? [answer]
16. Which came first, the word "Scrooge" or Charles Dickens' character "Scrooge"? [answer]
17. Who was the first person to write a modern novel? [answer]
18. How did the novel develop? [answer]
19. Why are Jane Austen's novels still so popular today? [answer]
20. What is the greatest American novel? [answer]
21. Why was James Joyce's Ulysses banned in the United States? [answer]
22. What is Marcel Proust's claim to literary fame? [answer]
23. Who was the first distinctively American poet? [answer]
24. What was the Harlem Renaissance? [answer]

Fine Arts

1. What are the hallmarks of Sandro Botticelli's painting? [answer]
2. Why was the Medici family important to the Renaissance? [answer]
3. Did Michelangelo study anatomy? [answer]
4. Who is considered the greatest artist of the Renaissance? [answer]
5. Why is Titian considered the father of modern painting? [answer]
6. Why is Rembrandt ranked among the first "modern" artists? [answer]
7. What does the term "impressionism" mean? [answer]
8. Is Claude Monet considered the "father" of impressionism? [answer]
9. What are some of Pablo Picasso's contributions to modern art? [answer]
10. Why did people find Henri Matisse's work shocking? [answer]
11. Who made photography an art form? [answer]

Architecture

1. When was the Parthenon built? [answer]
2. How was the Roman Colosseum ruined? [answer]
3. When was Westminster Abbey built? [answer]
4. When was the Great Wall of China built? [answer]
5. Why is the Cathedral of Notre Dame so famous? [answer]
6. What caused the Tower of Pisa to lean sideways? [answer]
7. Why is the Alhambra in Spain important? [answer]
8. Why is the Brooklyn Bridge an important American landmark? [answer]
9. When did modern architecture begin? [answer]
10. Who invented the skyscraper? [answer]
11. What is the tallest building in the world? [answer]

Theater

1. When did the dramatic form of tragedy originate? [answer]
2. How old is the dramatic form of comedy? [answer]
3. What is No drama? [answer]
4. What are the elements of Japanese kabuki theater? [answer]
5. What is a passion play? [answer]
6. Why is the Globe Theater so famous? [answer]
7. What was vaudeville? [answer]

Music And Dance

1. Who was Johann Sebastian Bach? [answer]
2. How old was Mozart when he composed his first work? [answer]
3. Was Beethoven really deaf for most of his life? [answer]
4. What does Wagnerian mean? [answer]
5. Why were audiences so hostile to Arnold Schoenberg's music? [answer]
6. Why is Béla Bartók's music important? [answer]
7. Is Igor Stravinsky considered the most important composer of the twentieth century? [answer]
8. Who is credited with inventing jazz? [answer]
9. Is blues music older than jazz? [answer]
10. When did country music first emerge? [answer]
11. Is bluegrass a distinctly American form of music? [answer]
12. Who was Elvis Presley? [answer]
13. Who were The Beatles? [answer]
14. What is rock and roll? [answer]
15. Why is the Ballets Russes so famous? [answer]
16. Who was Balanchine? [answer]
17. How did modern dance begin? [answer]
18. Who founded the Dance Theater of Harlem? [answer]
19. How long has the waltz been danced? [answer]

Movies And Television

1. When was the first movie shown? [answer]
2. What are the milestones in motion picture history? [answer]
3. What was the Hollywood "Black List"? [answer]
4. What were newsreels? [answer]
5. What was the radio's cultural impact? [answer]
6. What was the immediate impact of television? [answer]
7. Which was the first television network? [answer]
8. What was the impact of network television? [answer]
9. When was public broadcasting founded? [answer]
10. How did cable television develop? [answer]
11. How did CNN change television news? [answer]
12. When did MTV first air? [answer]
13. When was the VCR introduced and what has been its impact? [answer]
14. What is satellite television? [answer]
15. What is a DVD? [answer]
16. How old are card games? [answer]

Games

1. When was poker invented? [answer]
2. What is contract bridge? [answer]
3. What is mah jongg? [answer]
4. Who was Edmond Hoyle? [answer]
5. How old is chess? [answer]
6. How are pool and billiards different? [answer]
7. What is Go? [answer]
8. When were the first Olympic Games? [answer]
9. When were the first Olympic Winter Games? [answer]
10. Have the Olympic Games been held regularly since 1896? [answer]
11. How old is baseball? [answer]
12. Who invented basketball? [answer]
13. When did football begin? [answer]
14. How old is golf? [answer]
15. How old is tennis? [answer]
16. When was hockey invented? [answer]
17. What ball game is played in more countries than any other? [answer]