The Wombat File Is Yours to Keep

Before I say anything more about the past weeks of insanely prolonged trivitastical competition, let me extend my heartfelt thanks to all the participants. By continuing to indulge the Wombat in this monstrously inflated exercise in cortex-wastage, you have enabled me for the past month and a half to avoid actually writing about anything in this space. For this, you have my sincere gratitude.

Now, on to the victors and a few brief notes about our competition. The Whiskey Rebellion proved they were worthy of the illustrious name (which harks back to the early days), holding onto their lead against a dramatic last-round rally by the Factoids, who got more correct pre-clue answers in than any other team in the fourth set. Dedicated attention to the tactical advantages of the Lightning Round was also key to the Rebel strategy.

Lady and gentlemen, we bow before your undisputed Quizmastery. Let the word go out among the nations and the peoples thereof: thou hast conquered.

A few notes about the final round questions: Nobody got Question #1 until the clue was given: "Buccaneer," according to the OED, has the fascinatingly complex origin as described in the question.

And it was Shaw, not Wells, who was in on the LSE founding -- and the progressive group in question were the Fabian Society.

Fauchard's pioneering work in dentistry was hard, actually, to formulate into a brain-teaser; among other things he was in favor of was mouthwashing with urine -- but he was merely endorsing a sensible, ancient practice (the ammonia, y'see, is an effective anti-plaque agent!), so I couldn't say he'd invented the idea. He does seem to have given us metal fillings, the drill, various implements for extracting teeth, and many other dental standards. Mention him to your participating dentist and receive a free commemorative gum stimulator!

I didn't know that Bayer had tried to peddle heroin to kids until I was researching this question. On question five, everyone guessed Kennedy until they guessed Eisenhower. And nobody blinked an eye about Churchill as a "former" British P.M. -- even though I could have been sneaky and said he was a "future" prime minister, because actually he was, on account of the fact that he went back and served another term in the 50's. Hah. That'll show you. Won't it? It won't? Really? Well, all right then.

As for the final question...you either knew the "Love, American Style" connection to "Happy Days" -- which originated as one of LAS's mini-stories -- or you didn't. Wanted to get a "jump the shark" reference in there somewhere, but I didn't see how I could do it. Of course, many of you were itching to add "Joanie Loves Chachi" in there...but nobody mentioned the other Happy Days spinoffs, "Blansky's Beauties" and "Out of the Blue." I had no prior knowledge of the existence of these doomed programs, until I put this question together. The information has in no way improved my life.

Shortly, I'll give you all a preview of the prizes, which will be distributed to one and all (note: if I don't have your mailing address, send it post-haste. The Whiskey Rebels, of course, will get the pick of the litter. And we do mean litter.

Thanks again, everyone, for making this first team competition so much fun.