Trivial Endeavours
by Bill Schleizer

[Author Note: Since it was just Earth Day, I figure that everyone has just heard enough about our fair planet to last awhile—so, enviro(n)mentalisms is taking a much needed vacay. This opportunity also allows me to be a little less one-dimensional and write about something other than the Environment. ]

I grew up in small town in central Wisconsin, a quaint little place with a downtown square that was built by Polish immigrants in the mid 1800s. The town is nicknamed the “Gateway to the Pineries” due to its importance in the lumber days of yore. Lumberjacks aplenty used to reside temporarily in this sleepy little hamlet, drinking their nights away at the many taverns in the downtown area. A university was established here sometime thereafter, and a college radio station followed.

The college radio station is the beginning of this particular trivial story. 38 years ago, WWSP, the radio station at the university put together a trivia contest that has since developed into the “World’s Largest Trivia Contest”—and with over 400 teams and 12,000+ participants, it’s hard to argue that it isn’t. Keep in mind that population of Stevens Point, where this event is held, is just over 24,000.

The contest itself is a fundraiser for the radio station; teams pay an entry fee to compete and buy gobs and gobs of poorly designed merchandise with the proceeds going to scholarships and equipment purchases to keep the station afloat and growing. But, it’s so much more than that, it takes over an entire community for a weekend (and for some it’s a year-long obsession). For me, it’s a bit high school reunion, a bit competition, and a bit of wackiness.

Okay, here’s the rundown of the contest. It’s written by a man named “The Oz” and his protégé, “The Eck.” The topics covered range from all things media: television, movies, radio, advertising, sports, games, and entertainers with a dash of current events, science, literature and other randomness. The contest starts at 6pm on a Friday in April and goes continuously until Midnight on Sunday. 54 hours long, non-stop. Eight questions are asked each hour over the radio station airwaves. Teams then have the length of two songs to call in their answer to the radio station, which has a bank of 18 phone operators—all volunteers for four-hour shifts. The midnight-1am hours have 10 questions, but teams only get the length of one song (at least four minutes) to call in. The 6pm-7pm hours on Saturday and Sunday only have 4 questions with a half-hour break when the standings are read. It’s usually around 428 questions.

Teams huddle in basements, hotel rooms, dorms and other inhabitable spaces to participate. There is no limit on the number of players per team, and the range is 1-100 with most in the 20-30 range. Many teams have been playing together from 20 years or more. Luckily, there are opportunities to leave team headquarters during the contest (which can get smelly, if showers are not taken on a regular basis). There is a weekend long scavenger hunt around town where you follow clues to collect points as well as two Running Questions which are shorter scavenger hunts that occur at 7am on Saturday and Sunday morning where more points can be gained. There are also three music snippet questions during the contest. Personally, I abhor the music snippets, which are a collection of 8 songs with random parts taken out that teams are tasked to identify. I got one snippet out of the 24 this year, Private Dancer by Tina Turner.

Trivia weekend is a celebration of those mundane factoids that clog up the cerebral synapses and then some. It’s a crazy slice of Americana. Many teams, including mine, take notes on movies and tv shows during the year so that we may correctly identify the number of the locomotive engine in a 1948 racing movie. I only take notes sporadically, at best, but about a half dozen of my teammates are much more rigorous. The team has a library of reference material and we have the ability to have twenty-four computers cruising the information superhighway at anytime.

Is there fame? Not really. Prizes? Nope. Glory? You better believe it. The top ten teams get a trophy, no one plays this game to reap any rewards besides a misguided sense of accomplishment and self-satisfaction. Points are awarded throughout the contest for correct answers, snippet identification and scavenger hunts. Questions are valued by the number of teams that get it correct. The point value is assigned by taking 2000, dividing by the number of teams that answered correctly and rounding to the nearest 5. The Holy Grail is the 500-point questions, which means only one team has answered correctly. In the 29-history of the team that I now play on, we have gotten two 500-point questions. Easy questions end up being valued at 5 and 10 points. This year, I had two incredible guesses, one which yielded the team 200 points and the other 125 points. So, it’s not all about studious notes, random luck does play a factor as well.

But fifty-four hours??? Yep. I have never stayed up the entire contest, I tried once and failed around Hour 48. This year, I had a plan to sleep early in the contest for 3 or 4 hours and then finish strong. Somehow, that didn’t happen and I ended up staying up from seven a.m. on Friday morning to nine a.m. Sunday morning (that’s 50 hours!), then sleeping for 3 hours, and finishing the contest in a delirious type of state. Our team captain has stayed up the entire contest for several years now, I have no idea how it is accomplished. We ended up in sixth place this year, our best finish ever, and third consecutive year in the Top Ten. We get to go to the awards ceremony at 1:30 a.m. Monday morning after the contest, which can be tough (and really adds to the exhaustion).

It’s just fun to know the name of the baseball bat that Shelley Duvall uses to hit Jack Nicholson with in The Shining. The excitement of the contest is hard to describe, and incomprehensible to some. But to everyone, it’s trivial.

For more information: There’s a documentary about it. There’s a book chapter about it written by the all-time Jeopardy! Champion. And there has been plenty of newspaper articles about it. Speaking of Jeopardy!, the contest was actually used in a question in the show once. There’s even a parade before the contest begins, and a couple actually got married on a float this year.

Documentary: www.triviatownmovie.com
Official Website: www.90fmtrivia.org
My team: www.dads-computers.com
Book Excerpt: www.ken-jennings.com/excerpt3.html
USA Today Article: www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-04-19-town-trivia_N.htm