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WISCO QUIZ
OK, the prep is over. It’s time to see what you’ve learned during this 12-page immersion in all things Wisconsin. That is what we’d say if we were introducing a basic Wisconsin trivia contest. But no. This is not that. This is a quiz that will separate the creamiest curds from the wannabe whey. The season ticket holders from the StubHubbers. The born-and-breds from the FIBs. So uncap your Parker pen (the one you got back when they were still made in Janesville, natch) and take a deep breath for this true test of Wisconsin wits.
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The Quiz
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- The American Birkebeiner, in which athletes typically traverse 50 rugged kilometers between Cable and Hayward, is the world’s largest race in what sport?
- What’s the name of the insurance company that flies the world’s largest free-flying American flag some 400 feet above its Sheboygan headquarters?
- Name one of the three rivers that form most of the northern boundary of Wisconsin.
- This native of Oklahoma represented Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District encompassing most of the Northwoods from 1969 to 2011, making him the state’s longest-serving member of Congress.
- The official state (and world) record of this state fish is a 69-pound, 11-ounce, 63.5-inch-long monster pulled from the Chippewa Flowage in Sawyer County in 1949.
- On Feb. 2, 2015, Jon Freund, the mayor of the Madison suburb of Sun Prairie, was bitten by an animal named Jimmy during a seasonal ceremony in the town center? What kind of critter is Jimmy?
- What’s the sum of the numbers designating Wisconsin’s five Interstate highways (excluding three-digit spurs)?
- Longtime Brewers infielder Jim Gantner hails from what Fond du Lac County town with a utopian name?
- The downtown of this Driftless Region village known for its apple orchards was essentially moved to higher ground, away from the Kickapoo River, after a series of floods in the first decade of this century. (It flooded again, the worst yet, in 2018.)
- This artist, known as “the mother of American Modernism” and noted for her lush paintings of flowers, has a middle school named after her in Madison, about 9 miles from the farmhouse where she was born.
- “That ’70s Show,” the 1998-2006 Fox comedy whose credits ended with a “Hello, Wisconsin” exclamation point, took place in what fictional city?
- What Native tribe now centered in northeastern Wisconsin settled here after being dispossessed of their territory in upstate New York in the 1820s?
- What’s the name of the largest Apostle Island? (Odd, she wasn’t in The Last Supper…)
- A roughly 2-mile canal completed in 1851 and closed in 1959 linked what two major rivers at Portage?
- The name of what Wisconsin county draws from the perilous passage dubbed Porte des Morts by the French?
- Ray Szmanda had a 22-year run as the pitchman for what Wisconsin-based business, where he reminded shoppers they could save big money?
- After establishing proto-Milwaukee settlement Kilbourntown, Byron Kilbourn lit out for points west. In 1857, he founded Kilbourn City, which is now called by what name, well known by vacationers across the Midwest?
- What national fast food chain began with a single restaurant in the little burg of Sauk City in 1984?
- In Rhinelander, an annual music festival and the local high school sports teams draw their name from what beast of folklore?
- The Chalet Cheese Cooperative in Monroe is the only U.S. producer of what fragrant semisoft cheese?
- Illusionist Harry Houdini, actor Willem Dafoe and notorious U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy all hailed from what city in the Fox Valley?
- The harvest of Wisconsin (and Marathon County in particular) accounts for nearly all of the United States’ production of what root crop?
- Wisconsin’s only operating nuclear power plant shares a name with a popular state forest nearby. What is that name?
- Madison was not the site of Wisconsin’s first capitol. It was actually built in 1836 in what (still small) town in the state’s southwestern lead mining region?
- Get on your bike and name the big global manufacturer based in little Waterloo.
- Who was a standout multi-sport athlete at Burlington High School years before becoming an oracular football broadcaster?
- Name the legislation that sparked historic protests at the State Capitol in 2011.
- Ten of Wisconsin’s 72 counties share a name with a U.S. president. Name at least half of them.
- Name the two automakers that had large assembly plants in Kenosha in Janesville.
- Judy Faulkner, on Forbes’ billionaires list with an estimated net worth of $2.5 billion, founded what health care records company in Madison in 1979?
- The presence of two major state correctional institutions has earned this town of about 11,000 residents the nickname “Prison City.”
- Name both UW System universities that are not named after the city in which they are located.
- Former teacher Tony Evers held what post immediately before becoming governor in 2019?
- The bed of what lake was mostly dry for nearly a year after it burst through its banks and drained into the nearby Wisconsin River in 2008?
- Hartland native Ben Askren holds an ignominious record for being on the receiving end of the fastest knockout (just five seconds) in the history of what sports league?
