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I’m still not quite old enough to be good at pub quizzes; a lack of Beatles knowledge is probably my own fault given their cultural ubiquity even to this day, but I’m a little young to make a decent era-based guess at which films were getting all the Oscar®s in ‘92 (The Silence of the Lambs, apparently).

However, it seems my guesswork as regards TV detective trivia is significantly in advance of my ability to guess how old Norman Wisdom was on retirement.

Which TV detective famously failed to ever reveal his first name?

My guess, from a summer a couple of years back wasted in part to daytime television, was Quincy…not once did he mention his forename in around six weeks (these were schooldays) of holiday.

The quizmistress informed us that it was, in fact, Columbo. However, a quick search on Wikipedia proved me super-right. Heads up, trivia fans:

Quincy’s first name was never mentioned during the entire Quincy, M.E. TV show run. In episode #33, “Accomplice To Murder”, however, his business card was seen with his name written as “Doctor R. Quincy”. Jack Klugman says that the question he’s most often asked by fans is, “What is Quincy’s first name?”. He answers, “Doctor”!

— from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quincy,_M.E.

Columbo’s first name is never explicitly revealed in the series. When pressed, he would insist that it was “Lieutenant”. Several sources cite the name “Philip Columbo”, variously claiming that the name was either in the original script for Prescription: Murder or that it was visible on his police badge. Peugeot even ran an advertising campaign that mentioned “Lt. Philip Columbo” as the most famous driver of the Peugeot convertible.

The name “Philip Columbo” was, in fact, invented by Fred L. Worth, author of The Trivia Encyclopedia, who planted the information in his book (and its sequels) in an attempt to catch out anyone who might try to violate his copyright. Fred’s ploy was, however, only partially successful.

In 1984 he filed a $300 million lawsuit against the distributers of the board game Trivial Pursuit, claiming that they had sourced their questions from his books; even to the point of reproducing mis-prints and typographical errors. The ace up his sleeve was “Philip Columbo”, which appeared in a game question, despite the name being an invention of Fred’s.

Trivial Pursuit did not deny they sourced material from Fred’s books (amongst others) and submitted that copying from a single source is plagiarism, but compiling information from several sources is called research. The judge agreed, ruling in favour of Trivial Pursuit and the case was thrown out of court.

The matter of Columbo’s name was finally laid to rest by the release of the first series on DVD. In the episode Dead Weight where Columbo introduces himself to General Hollister, the audience is shown a close-up of his badge, complete with the signature of “Frank Columbo”.

— from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbo

Admittedly I can’t claim any credit for this rightness as I had no idea at the time. But it’s always nice to have a bit of trivia to hand.

Another “fascinating” fact came up in a tie-breaker: did you know that the World record for “most dogs washed in eight hours by a team of twelve” is some 848?

My question, which the Internet does not seem to be able to answer, is what exactly constitutes a washed dog? Is taking a Chiouaoua by the tail and dunking it in some saline solution fair game? Or must you give a St Bernard a full shampoo, rinse and blow-dry? Presumably making a giant pop-up dunker (like an oversize, soapy-water-filled toaster) or leading the dogs through a car wash counts as illegal mechanisation… But would a sheep-dip-esque contraption, perhaps with fewer of the highly toxic organophosphates, be permissable?

Pub quizzes pose more questions than they answer.

Monday, September 26th, 2005 20:24 | permalink | trackback