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amusements

Annual Impossible Exam 2025

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As is now traditional here (but slightly earlier than in recent years), we once again we bring you this year’s King William’s College General Knowledge Paper 2025-26.

For over 120 years the College has set an annual general knowledge test, known as the General Knowledge Paper. The pupils sit the test twice: once unseen on the day before the Christmas holidays, and again when they return to school in the New Year – after spending the holiday researching the answers. The test used to be mandatory but these days participation is voluntary. Since 1951 the quiz has been published in the Guardian.

The quiz, which is always 18 sets of 10 questions, is well known to be highly difficult, a common score being just two correct answers. The best scores are around 12% for the unseen test and about 70% for the second attempt – and of course the average scores are going to be very much lower than this.

The quiz is always introduced with the Latin motto Scire ubi aliquid invenire possis, ea demum maxima pars eruditionis est, “To know where you can find anything is, after all, the greatest part of erudition” – something my father always impressed on me as “Education is not knowing, it is knowing where to find out”.

You can find this year’s General Knowledge Paper on the King William’s College website at https://kwc.im/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/GKP_2025_26.pdf and in the Guardian.

I’ve not yet tried this year’s test myself, but unseen I don’t normally have many more clues that the KWC pupils!

Enjoy the quiz as a break from festive preparations, or keep it to amuse the family over Christmas!

history, memes

December Quiz Answers

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Here are the answers to this month’s six quiz questions. If in doubt, all should be able to be easily verified online.

British History

  1. In what year was the Battle of Culloden? 1746
  2. How many monarchs reigned during the 19th century? 4 – George III, George IV, William IV, Victoria
  3. Who, in 1835, produced durable silver chloride camera negatives on paper and conceived the two-step negative-positive procedure used in most non-electronic photography up to the present? Henry Fox Talbot
  4. Charles Dodgson is remembered as an early photographer, but what else is he famous for? The Alice in Wonderland books (as Lewis Carroll)
  5. In what year was slavery abolished in the British empire? 1838
  6. What links playing cards in 1588; windows in 1696; candles in 1709; wallpaper in 1712? All were taxed starting in those years

Answers were correct when questions were compiled in late 2024.

books, memes, quotes

This Month’s Poem

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Halsway Carol
Iain Frisk

Lo for the tiding of the long night moon
Let the sunrise call about the morning soon
Short is the biding of the fading light
Sing for the coming of the longest night

North wind tell us what we need to know
When the stars are shining on the midnight snow
All of the branches will be turned to white
Sing for the coming of the longest night

  A winter day, the summer grass turned hay
  Frost in the field ’til the dawn of May
  A summer’s light never shone as clear or as bright
  So dance in the shadows of a winter’s night

Lo for the tiding of the long night moon
May the harvest last until the springtime bloom
Home is our comfort at the winter’s height
Sing for the coming of the longest night

All of the colours of the sunrise sky
Shine a light upon us, as the day goes by
Sun-setting shadows fading out of sight
Sing for the coming of the longest night

  A winter day, the summer grass turned hay
  Frost in the field ’til the dawn of May
  A summer’s light never shone as clear or as bright
  So dance in the shadows of a winter’s night

Find this poem online at Town Common Songs

amusements, memes

Ten Things

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This year our Ten Things column each month is alternating between composers and artists a century at a time from pre-1500 to 20th century. As always, there’s no guarantee you will have heard of them all!

Ten Artists Born in 20th Century

  1. David Hockney
    David Hockney; Nude, 17th June 1984
  2. Ed Burra
  3. Adrian Daintrey
  4. Tracey Emin
  5. Andy Warhol
  6. Jackson Pollock
  7. Eric Ravilious
  8. Alberto Giacometti
  9. Graham Clarke
  10. Damian Hirst
history, memes

December Quiz Questions

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Each month we’re posing six pub quiz style questions, with a different subject each month. As always, they’re designed to be difficult, but it is unlikely everyone will know all the answers – so have a bit of fun.

British History

  1. In what year was the Battle of Culloden?
  2. How many monarchs reigned during the 19th century?
  3. Who, in 1835, produced durable silver chloride camera negatives on paper and conceived the two-step negative-positive procedure used in most non-electronic photography up to the present?
  4. Charles Dodgson is remembered as an early photographer, but what else is he famous for?
  5. In what year was slavery abolished in the British empire?
  6. What links playing cards in 1588; windows in 1696; candles in 1709; wallpaper in 1712?

Answers will be posted in 2 weeks time.

history

December 1925

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Our look at some of the significant happenings 100 years ago this month.

5. Peter Paul Rubens’ portrait of Saint Teresa of Ávila was found in Berlin after being hidden for 200 years.

8. Born. Sammy Davis Jr, American singer, dancer, musician and actor (d.1990)

10. The 1925 Nobel Prize recipients included George Bernard Shaw (Literature).

11. Pope Pius XI promulgated Quas primas, an encyclical introducing the Feast of Christ the King.

13. Born. Dick Van Dyke, entertainer, in West Plains, Missouri

28. Born. Milton Obote, 2nd President of Uganda, in Apac (d.2005)

30. The historical epic film Ben-Hur was released in the United States.Ben-Hur chariot race

31. The first attempt at a worldwide New Year’s celebration was made via international radio. The United States sent out musical entertainment and New Year’s greetings from the consuls general of various foreign countries in New York. Evening listeners for participating stations across the United States heard a radio announcer in London say, “This is 2LO calling America and sending New Year’s greetings. We have received word that the American stations are broadcasting this program and we hope that it is being relayed successfully.”

history

What Happened in 1825

So here’s our last instalment of things that happened in ..25 years of yore.

Some Notable Events in 1825

9 February. After no presidential candidate receives a majority of United States Electoral College votes following the 1824 election, the House of Representatives elects John Quincy Adams as President.

24 February. Died. Thomas Bowdler, English physician responsible for the Family Shakespeare and other emasculated works (b.1754).

4 March. John Quincy Adams is sworn in as the sixth President of the United States.

May. The Australian city of Brisbane is founded.

4 May. Born. Thomas Henry Huxley, English biologist (d.1895).

7 May. Died. Antonio Salieri, Italian composer (b.1750).

26 May. Two Unitarian Christian bodies, the American Unitarian Association, and the British and Foreign Unitarian Association are founded, coincidentally, on the same date.

6 July. A new Combinations of Workmen Act in the UK makes trades unions legal according to narrowly defined principles.

6 August. Bolivia gains its independence from Spain as a replublic at the instigation of Simón Bolivar.

18 August. Scottish adventurer Gregor MacGregor issues a £300,000 loan with 2.5% interest, through the London bank of Thomas Jenkins & Company, for the fictitious Central American republic of Poyais. His actions lead to the Panic of 1825, the first modern stock market crash, in England.

27 September. The world’s first modern railway, the Stockton and Darlington Railway, opens in England.Stockton and Darlington Railway

25 October. Born. Johann Strauss, Junior, Austrian composer (d.1899).

26 October. The Erie Canal opens, providing passage from Albany, New York to Buffalo and Lake Erie.

Unknown Date. Hans Christian Ørsted reduces aluminium chloride to produce metallic aluminium.

Unknown Date. The first horse-drawn omnibuses established in London.

Unknown Date. London becomes the largest city in the world, taking the lead from Beijing.

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