As campus traditions go, the 50-hour sleep-deprived, brain-teasing adrenaline rush that is the Great Midwest Trivia Contest is hard to beat.
Those who don't play may never understand.
So players, pick your descriptor. Addictive. Obsessive. Strangely soothing.
Lawrence University's annual deep dive into dark, trivial, overwhelming trivia is upon us. The 54th edition of the Great Midwest Trivia Contest begins January 25 at 10:00:37 p.m. and closes at midnight on January 27th.
We know that. The annual competition, organized and performed each year by a group of student students, is woven into Lawrence's rich history, a quirky Friday-to-Sunday blitz that is part of the student experience, a connection to alumni, and an odd but fun link to the greater Fox Valley community.
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It began in the spring of 1966 and has received attention in recent years from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, among others.
In honor of those bonus 37-second waits on Friday night, we've rounded up 37 reasons why you should embrace 2019's trivia spectacle for what it is: Entertainment.
1: Indoor diversions can be good. It's a late January weekend in Wisconsin. Did you see the forecast?
2: The world is ours. The competition draws nearly 100 teams, more than three-quarters of which come from campus. While most teams build markets in or around Appleton, webcasting brings in off-campus teams from around the country and sometimes the world.
3: campus rights. Being named head trivia master is, well, huge. Miranda Salazar '19 took on the challenge this year. And it's no small challenge. “It's a 50-hour straight event and I've spent five times that on this competition to get it where it needed to be,” he said.
4 to 15: Great price. Of course, Salazar is not alone in her devotion. She has a team of 12 carefully selected trivia masters who help her craft questions, do the legwork and work throughout the marathon weekend at WLFM headquarters.
16: The president is all in. As part of the five-plus-decade tradition, President Mark Burstein will kick off the contest by asking the first question on Friday night. Veterans of the annual competition know there is a lead – the last question from a year ago, known as Super Garuda, is the first question of this year's competition. More on that later.
17: Moves fast. Questions come every five minutes. Teams have three minutes to find the answer and call it out. “This year's theme is fast, efficient, streamlined,” Salazar said. “We take what people like about trivia, what we like about trivia, and we distill it down. We try to ask as many questions as possible, take as many song requests as possible and be as responsive as possible.”
18: Connections. Those who work in the competition forge relationships with those who came before. Long before. “I email the guy who founded it (in 1966), JB deRosset … and even he doesn't really know why it's still around,” Salazar said of the pageant's enduring appeal. “He notices that he is still alive. That's what he calls it, like a living thing.”
19: Seriously, not everything has to be, you know, serious. “I think it's really that once you start playing, it's contagiously fun,” Salazar said. “Once you get the bug it's really so much fun. It's a way to hang out with friends, collect silly things, not take yourself too seriously, while also spending your time on something.”
20: Cameras on campus: Spectrum TV was on campus last week to capture some of the fun before the big weekend. Watch it air this week.
21: A podcast is born. Brothers Bryan and Matt Peters, veterans of Great Midwest Trivia for more than a decade, love the contest so much they've started a podcast in its honor. “We love trivia and the history around it and want to see the contest grow,” Bryan said. “That's our goal with the podcast. Bring new people into the competition and bring back the people who left.” The first two episodes of the Trivia Brothers podcast are complete. Find a related Facebook page by searching The Trivia Brothers.
22: Traditions rule. Part of the continuing appeal is tied to the traditions that are broadcast each year. Some are public, others a little more inside. The worthless prizes, the armadillo, Toto's 'Africa' song. “We have a pretty big alumni community,” Salazar said. “We really function like a fraternity or a sorority in that we have a group of alumni that we lean on and ask questions and talk to.”
23: A recruiting tool? You make a bet. Salazar knows firsthand how the trivia contest can be a calling card for prospective Lawrenceians. As a high school senior in Delaware four years ago, the trivia contest was that quirky thing that separated Lawrence from other schools, he said. “I knew I wanted to play trivia when I toured Lawrence. It was one of the things that made me want to come here, that made it special or unique to me.”
24: Google is your friend. The competition has evolved over the years. Google is now not only encouraged, but somewhat mandatory. The thrill is in the hunt.
25: A team is a team is a team. You can go alone. You can start a new group with friends. You can join an existing group. “My freshman year … I got seven of us together and we got together in a room and got snacks and made it our base for the weekend,” Salazar said. “That's how I got stuck into it.”
26: The winners are crowned: Come midnight on Sunday, there will be a gathering to announce the new champions and share out those junk prizes, mostly found items from the WLFM studio. Broken bun, anyone? “The awards are less than valuable,” Salazar said. “Also, there is a tradition of breaking first prize.”
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27: It's not for everyone, but it's not boring either. “When I started researching colleges, I was always looking for something quirky or different, and some of them are kind of boring,” Salazar said. “Schools will say we have a tradition that we all have a picnic at the end of the year, which is not so much fun. But when I read about it (trivia contest), I said I want to do that.”
28: You can still enter. Registration takes place at 20:00 on Friday. A team representative should call to provide the necessary team information. It is so simple. Find details at https://blogs.lawrence.edu/trivia.
29: Creativity comes into play. Action questions may require some dress or perhaps some video production or songwriting on the spot. So it's fun.
30: There is a rocker. When calling on an answer, teams get three guesses.
31: Winning is nice, names are fun. Last year's off-campus champion was The Holy Broman Lonestar Republic Presents: Cardboard Davy Crocket Remembers the Alamo. The campus title went to The Cult of the Pink Shoe.
32: Friends remain friends. Trivia remains a great link once you leave Lawrence. “I'm going to keep playing,” Salazar said. “There's a great alumni group out there with a lot of my friends in it. But if everyone continues to play in the same team, it will be very strong. So, I'm going to start my own alumni group. I'll give them some competition.”
33 to 35: Know your Garudas. Come late Sunday, things get tough. The three Garudas are billed as extremely difficult questions and have increased scoring (25 to 50 points instead of the usual five) and overtime (10 minutes to answer instead of the usual three).
36: The big one. The Super Garuda question always closes the show and then opens the next year's competition. Super Garuda 2018, written by Salazar, did not get any correct answers to close out last year's contest (worth 100 points). The question: In the Tanzanian city whose name is an anagram for “A Salad Smear”, there is an intersection of two roads near the Embassy of the Kingdom of Morocco. One street shares the first name with the former Paramount Chief of Gogo and the other street has the name of a Sultan of Tanzania whose skull return is discussed in the Treaty of Versailles of 1919. On the wall in front of the intersection are three large legibly engraved words in english, what are they? The answer: “The jungle, Bob.”
37: There is pressure. Salazar feels it. “It's a big job,” he said of this grand master. “This is a 54-year-old tradition, don't mess with it.”
If you play
What: Lawrence University's Great Midwest Trivia Contest
When: Starts at 10:00:37 PM. Friday and runs until midnight Sunday.
Where: Streams live on WLFM, the school's radio station,
