Final Jeopardy: Historic Sites (5-8-15)

The Final Jeopardy question (5/8/2015), in the category “Historic Sites” was:

On August 15, 1941, convicted Nazi spy Josef Jakobs became the last person to be put to death here.

New champ Andrew Haringer won $8,799 in yesterday’s match, when no one knew the FJ answer. In the last game of the week, he is up against these players: Louis Virtel, originally from Lemont, IL; and Mary Green, from Milton, GA.

Round 1: Andrew found the Jeopardy! round Daily Double in “Fads & Fashions” under the $600 clue. He was in the lead with $6,800, $4,400 more than Louis in second place. He bet $3,200 and he was RIGHT.

Urban Dictionary says these “are organized via mass communications to come together… perform… then disperse.” show

Andrew finished in the lead with $12,200. Louis was second with $4,400 and Mary was last with $800.

Round 2: Louis found the first Daily Double in “A. Miller’s Tale” under the $1,600 clue. He was in second place with $6,000, $6,200 less than Andrew’s lead. He bet $5,000 and he was RIGHT.

Arthur Miller thought 1690s Salem was relevant to 1950s America when he wrote this play. show

Louis found the last Daily Double in “What an Invention” under the $1,600 clue. He was now in the lead with $19,400, $6,000 ahead of Andrew in second place. He bet $5,000 again and thought it was LAN. That was WRONG.

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Louis finished in the lead with $16,000. Andrew was next with $15,400 and Mary was in third place with $10,000.

Only ONE of the contestants got Final Jeopardy! right.

WHAT IS THE TOWER OF LONDON?

Josef Jakobs “was an untrained, ill-equipped German spy who was parachuted into Britain in February 1941, apparently charged with sending details of London weather patterns back to the Fatherland. But he broke his ankle in a bungled leap from the plane…. The 43-year-old father of three was tried by a court martial, found guilty of treason and at 7.12am on 15 August 1941 was taken to the practice range at the Tower where, blindfolded and with a white marker over his heart, he was shot by eight soldiers from the Scots Guards.” A Bloody Tale from the Tower describes his granddaughter, Giselle’s efforts to learn more about Jakobs’ fate. “There is so much more to his story than just a trivia question,” she says.



Mary wrote down “the Ba.” She lost her $9,500 bet and finished with $500.

Andrew got it right. He bet it all and that brought him up to $30,800.

Louis wrote down “Auschwicz.” That cost him $14,801 bet so he wound up in second place with $1,199.

So Andrew remains the champ and he certainly made up for yesterday’s low win. His 2-day total is $39,599.

FJ Results: 5-8-15

During the chat, Andrew talked about a recent course he taught on the history of the piano.

2 years ago:: Only ONE of the players got this FJ in “Authors in the News”

When Curiosity touched down on Mars in 2012, its landing site was named in honor of this author who died weeks before. show

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12 Responses

  1. jacob ska says:

    Andrew came through again with old movies. This time it was Bedlam (1946) starring Boris Karloff. He must be into the old films. Great going in the match between the contestants. This was a good game.

    Couldn’t help but laugh in the NASCAR category when Louis got Toyota correct with its logo on the car as clear as daylight glaring at him. Btw, he was really sharp during the game. Couldn’t understand his wagering logic in fj though.

    @VJ, one it was. Congrats Andrew!

    Thanks Doris.

    • VJ says:

      yeah, congrats, Jacob, I got on the right line for once. ha ha ha.

      And, yes hats off to Andrew on Bedlam. I love Karloff.

    • Eric S says:

      Louis’ bet in FJ was pretty straight forward: he bet the minimum amount needed to cover Andrew’s double-up while retaining some in case the other two players went all-in and missed.
      Andrew’s bet, however, displayed weak game theory as he could have locked Mary out completely with a wager between 4600 and 5400 (exclusive, of course) and still won with a Louis miss.

      • jacob ska says:

        Well, since Andrew is a History professor he must have felt comfortable with the category which is why he probably went all in. Don’t think game theory was on his mind since the category was in his wheelhouse. He probably was thinking “I got this!”

        He sure as heck knows the old movie stars. When the photo of Marlene Dietrich was displayed in yesterday’s game even Trebek expressed surprise at him recognizing her from a 1930 movie.

      • Eric S says:

        To be clear,” good” game theory just maximizes the chance of winning, not how much is won. On FJ, it rarely incorporates the category of the clue, usually only a numerical analysis.

      • jacob ska says:

        @Eric, if you read J Board Louis has posted a detailed explanation of his game and the fact that his brother Jim was on Jeopardy in 2012. The Virtel brothers are Jeopardy experts imo.

    • doris s. says:

      How so? If A. bet it all and was right it would bring him to 30.800(and it did). In order to beat him by 1 dollar, Louis had to wager 14.801 to end up with 30.801.I don’t see any mistake there??? Louis had to presume that Andrew would bet it all (there is always that possibility) and not repeat yesterday’s wager. Yesterday A. just bet enough to end up 1 dollar higher than Scott (2.401)hoping that Scott would either wager nothing or get it wrong.
      Had Louis been right today in FJ he would have beaten Andrew by a buck.
      How would you have wagered differently??

    • Tom Clark says:

      And Boris Karloff co-starred with Basil Rathbone in a 1939 movie called “Tower of London.” He played the executioner. It’s possible knowing old Karloff movies enabled Andrew (like me) to quickly think of the Tower of London as a place of execution. And people used to tell me watching old horror movies was a waste of time. Ha!

  2. doris s. says:

    So VJ and jacob were right.
    Either not quick enough in making the deduction…or neglecting the year just plain or not knowing the first thing about concentration camps I’m sorry to say to Louis.AUSCHWITZ..? The killing would go on there till 1945. I wonder what Mary was possibly going for? “the Ba”??
    Anyway, congratulations again to Andrew to be the only one to get this. He looks VERY young but apparently has an idea about history way before he was born or just made the proper connections fast enough.
    The best part for him since he is from Canada: NO TAXES on his winnings 🙂
    And congrats to VJ and jacob for a correct prediction.
    P.S.
    Missed the show today (power outage), so I was wondering if Andrew gave the complete answer or just “The Tower”? Would j have accepted just “Tower”?
    Have a good one everybody, see you Monday for our “celebrities”.

    • Tom Clark says:

      My guess is Mary was going for “The Bastille.”

      • doris s. says:

        Yes, that would be the only thing that would make some sense, were it not for the fact that in August ’41 France was already occupied by Germany for over a year, save for “unoccupied” Vichy…

  3. Eric S says:

    FJ: speechless, stunned: will probably laugh/cry simultaneously.