Your mission, should you choose to accept it...

September 25, 2007 6:23 AM

Help me come up with some spy trivia for a Customer Service appreciation quiz.

My company is have a Customer Service appreciation week. One of the days is listed as having a Mission Impossible type theme, and I was tasked with coming up with some activities.

We are going to have a costume contest, a mystery prize package, and a trivia contest. This last is where I could use some help; my plan is to have three different quizzes, each one more difficult than the last. The questions need to be asked in such a way as to have short, simple answers (about 500 people participating and questions will likely be checked by hand).

Q: An example: When did the Office of Strategic Services begin operations?

A: June 1942

The people answering will have internet access. And I'm interested in questions that involve movie trivia (Bond, Spy Kids, Enemy of the State, etc) as well as real operative lore.

posted by quin to society & culture (8 comments total)

These James Bond lists should produce some pretty good Q & As.

List of Bond Girls

List of Bond Villains

List of Bond Firearms

This page on Spy Fiction can surely generate some ideas.

Also:

List of Japanese spies, 1930-45

List of gadgets from Totally Spies!

Famous spies in history

Famous Women Spies

The Atom Spy Case

'Spies' @ CrimeLibrary.com

20th-Century Deceptions

Top 10 Famous Spies (scroll down)
posted by B(oYo)BIES at 6:44 AM on September 25, 2007

For the book I was working on this summer, I did a lot of research on women spies. The two fun facts I liked best: Julia Child was a spy before she was a chef, and the Girl Guides (British version of the Girl Scouts) also were used as spies in WWI.
posted by mothershock at 6:54 AM on September 25, 2007

Along the same line as above: List of Espionage Techniques. I sure it is easy to come up with questions that have the answers of "dead drop", "cryptography" and "stenography".

Another fun question might be to use the Bond girl list from above and ask the people to put a list of the Bond Girls in order of appearance.

You could also ask people to match the spy agency to the country e.g. KGB, Mossad, NSA, etc.
posted by mmascolino at 7:31 AM on September 25, 2007

I always liked the trivia that Stewart Copeland (drummer in The Police) was Miles Copeland Jr., a distinguished CIA officer, and his mum was in British Intelligence (SOE).

Here's another: James Bond married twice. To whom?
posted by idb at 8:30 AM on September 25, 2007

oops...typo...Stewart Copeland's dad was...
posted by idb at 8:31 AM on September 25, 2007

Two somewhat related trivia questions:

What does Coventry have to do with spying?

Who said 'My geese that laid the golden eggs and never cackled' and what or who was he talking about?
posted by jamjam at 9:50 AM on September 25, 2007

Not sure if counter-intelligence counts as spying, but I love the true story of Operation Mincemeat
posted by happyturtle at 11:20 AM on September 25, 2007

Just a tip from someone who's worked as a judge at World Trivia Night - you want your questions to be specific and have short, succint answers. "What does Coventry have to do with spying?" is too vague and general. Better to ask, "Who let Coventry burn at the hands of the German Air Force in 1940 rather than compromise a sensitive source of intelligence?"

Another good idea is to mix up the types of trivia, from movies to music to history, all the while maintaining your spy theme. For example:

What I Spy star was the first African-American to appear on the cover of TV Guide? (Bill Cosby)
What type of fruit is available in a variety called "Northern Spy"? (apple)
What artist's album entitled Spy yielded the Top 40 hit "Vengeance"? (Carly Simon)
posted by Oriole Adams at 1:47 PM on September 25, 2007