[ jeopardy ]

The following transcript is from a 1964 episode of the American game show "Jeopardy!" hosted by Art Fleming. My mother, Nancy Meise, was one of the contestants. I was six years away from being born.

Since this was in the era before videotape, or even audio cassette tape, my father's only way of documenting the event was to borrow a reel-to-reel tape recorder from his office. The tape sat unheard on a shelf for 25 years until one Christmas I transferred it to modern audio cassette.

Readers familiar with the current version of "Jeopardy!" will recognize the format is almost the same, except the cash in the current show is ten times greater. Also, in the original show, non-winners got to keep whatever money they made, which discouraged wild gambles in Final Jeopardy.

If you get tired with the play-by-play, please do skip ahead to the Thoughts section at the end of the page, as I do have a small point to make.

Enjoy.

DON PARDONow entering the studio are today's contestants. This is Mrs. Mary Cox, a housewife from South Hamboy, New Jersey. This is Mrs. Nancy Meise, a housewife from Redbank, New Jersey. This is yesterday's champion, Mr. John Natwick, a businessman from Wisconsin Rapids, who has won $400. These three people will compete for cash prizes today on Jeopardy! And here is the star of Jeopardy, Art Fleming! ART FLEMMING Good Morning, thank you, thank you Don Pardo, thank you friends. Good Morning, one and all. Thank you so very much. Well, we're going to try to brighten your day somewhat by playing our answer and question game Jeopardy! You know whoever wins the most money today, becomes our champion, completes the day, and returns to complete a week tomorrow. So let's meet the panel of players. First we have to the lovely Mrs. Mary Cox, a housewife from South Hamboy, New Jersey. MARY Hi. ART FLEMMING Hi Mary, do you have any children? MARY Yes, I have two. I have a boy, ten, and a girl eight years-old. ART FLEMMING Uh-huh. And what kind of work does your husband do? MARY He works for a company that makes paper. ART FLEMMING Do you have any idea what he does he does with the paper? MARY He's involved with the actual production of cigarette paper. ART FLEMMING I see, cigarette paper. Does he roll his own? MARY No, no. He still buys them already rolled. ART FLEMMING Ok. Welcome Mary, it's nice to have you on the program. Here's Mrs. Nancy Meise, a housewife from Redbank, New Jersey. Welcome, Nancy. NANCY Oh, I'm very glad to be here. ART FLEMMING The pleasure's all ours, believe us. Meise, now, is that German? NANCY Yes, it is a German name. ART FLEMMING I see. What does Meise mean? NANCY Well, it means titmouse in German. ART FLEMMING Titmouse, uh-huh. And do you have any hobbies, Nancy? NANCY I enjoy skiing, and playing some bridge, and skating. ART FLEMMING Snow-skiing or water-skiing? NANCY Snow-skiing. ART FLEMMING No water-skiing? NANCY No water-skiing. ART FLEMMING Why's that? NANCY Well, it's a little bit harder, I think, to water-ski than to snow-ski. And I'm sort of afraid of the water, so I'll stick to the snow-skiing. ART FLEMMING And the landing is a little harder too... NANCY Yes, unfortuately. ART FLEMMING Welcome Nancy. And here now's our champion, Mr. John Natwick, a businessman from Wisconsin Rapids, who's making his second appearance. Yesterday, John, you won $400 dollars. Boy. How's that going? JOHN I don't know, I don't know. It's real tough. I can't figure it out but it's real nice, I'll say that. ART FLEMMING Twenty-four hours have passed and you're still not quite sure what's happening. JOHN Not sure what's happening. ART FLEMMING By the way, you were telling us yesterday from Wisconsin Rapids that you're in the manufacturing of paper also. You get involved, like Mrs. Cox's husband, in paper? JOHN I certainly do. I've been involved in the paper industry for about 31 years. ART FLEMMING And it looks like you're involved again with $400 dollars in winnings. Nice to have you on the program. We're going to play the first half of our show in just a minute, but first, do you know about the new personal deodorant that's perfect for the whole family? If not, watch with us.

[Right Guard Deodorant Commercial]

ART FLEMMINGAll right friends, let's play Jeopardy! Well, panel, there you see them, the categories: Hodgepdoge, Themes and Trademarks, Fictional Characters, Show Biz, The 30's, Travel and Tourism. Anyone of you may ring when you recoginize the answer. Remember the Jeopardy: if you're wrong, the amount of money allotted to the answer will be deducted from your winnings. Now panel, whoever gives the correct question, will select the next category and amount. And too, when you hear this sound {DINK-DINK, DINK-DINK}, the round is over. We have Mary, Nancy and John as the players. John is the champion, making his second appearance, so please John, select for all three.

TRAVEL & TOURISM 10
Airline's term for bargain months in European travel.

JOHNWhat is thrift season? ART FLEMMING All right. Off season, thrift season, correct.

TRAVEL & TOURISM 20
Land set aside for a special purpose or securing accomodations.

MARYWhat is a reservation?

HODGEPODGE 10
How the next bride to be is found.

NANCYWhat happens to the person who catches the bouquet?

TRAVEL & TOURISM 30
Swiss winter sport center or New York City hotel.

ART FLEMMING(no answer) St. Moritz. Nancy?

TRAVEL & TOURISM 40
Cheyenne's annual weeklong pageant and rodeo.

JOHNWhat is Frontier Days?

HODGEPODGE 20
Swimming kick named for a cutting device.

MARYWhat is a scissor's kick?

HODGEPODGE 30
Travel by walking and getting free rides from passing cars.

JOHNWhat is hitchhiking?

HODGEPODGE 40
Naval officer's rank, or a flag.

NANCYWhat is an ensign?

HODGEPODGE 50
Word for the green, oxidized film on old bronze.

JOHNWhat is patina?

THIRTIES 10
He became Pope in 39.

MARYWho is Pius XII?

THEMES 10
Shirley Temple trademark that showed when she smiled.

MARYWhat is a dimple?

THEMES 20
Magazine, or famous seal of approval.

JOHNWhat is Good Housekeeping?

FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 10
Walking east, he follows you in the AM, leads you in the PM.

MARYWho is my shadow? ART FLEMMING John has $150, Mary is in second place with $70, and Nancy, with $50. We'll be back with more of Jeopardy in a minute. But now, here's how to save 180 calories a day, with Sucaryl.

[Sucaryl Commercial. Sucaryl and other cylco- sweeteners were found in the 1970's to be carcinogenic, more so than saccharine.]

ART FLEMMINGAll right, panel, we continue on with Jeopardy! and we have Mary answering the last correct question.

THEMES 30
The mottos of the French Revolution.

JOHNWhat are Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity?

THIRTIES 20
Radio's fiery horse with the speed of light.

NANCYWho was Silver?

THEMES 40
Alamo hero whose knife was his famous trademark.

JOHNWho was Bowie?

THEMES 50
Packard Motors motto.

ART FLEMMINGNo idea? Ask the man who owns one.

THIRTIES 30
Government agency founded for the relief of ex soldiers in 1930
.

ART FLEMMINGNo idea? The Veterans Administration.

THIRTIES 40
On radio, she was always looking for her lost brother.

ART FLEMMINGQuite a gal she was, too, Gracie Allen.

THIRTIES 50
The two Amendments to the Constitution in the THIRTIES.

ART FLEMMINGJohn, I'm sorry, you rang after the buzzer, they were the 20 th and the 21st: Lame Duck and Prohibition Amendments.

FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 20
Dicken's workhouse urchin apprenticed to a thieves' den.

JOHNWho was Oliver Twist?

FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 30
The Little Women's family name.

NANCYWhat was March?

FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 40
Captain Smallot and Dr. Lizey were this boy's friends.

JOHNWho was Jim?

FICTIONAL CHARACTERS 50
Ellen Douglass is the heroine of this Sir Walter Scott poem.

ART FLEMMINGSir Walter Scott's The Lady in the Lake.

TRAVEL & TOURISM 50
What servis compris means?

ART FLEMMINGNo idea? What's a service charge?

SHOWBIZ 10
Miniature word for female Hollywood hopeful.

NANCYWhat is a starlet?

SHOWBIZ 20
Often Boston, Philadelphia, and New Haven are used.

NANCYWhat are places where shows are tried before they appear on Broadway?

After this, the tape degenerates into fuzz. In the end, John ends up winning on an easy Final Jeopardy! question about the Spanish-American war, which all three contestants get right. Nancy, my mother, pockets $500, which goes toward paying off the loan for the carpet in their new house.

THOUGHTS

One aspect I find strange is how the technology used to preserve this memory (reel-to-reel tape) had effectively prevented us from ever experiencing it. Had I not stumbled across an old reel-to-reel player at college, I might never have thought to transfer it to "modern" tape. In another 25 years, it might be impossible to find a working reel-to-reel machine. Or an audio-cassette player, for that matter.

In all our discussions about emerging formats, we often forget the importance of existing formats. No doubt many readers have old documents on 5 1/4" floppy disks with no drive to play them on. Worse yet, they may be from hardware platforms (Atari, Commodore) or applications that no longer exist. Which begs the question...

If a document is unreadable, is it still a document?

There's a delicious irony to placing this transcript on the Web. It's been coded in HTML, an ugly-if-effective structure for plain old ASCII text. In theory, it should remain readable as long as ASCII endures. Suffice to say the clock is ticking. I'm sure the makers of reel-to-reel tape thought they'd be around forever, too.

P.S....

To this day, my mother watches every episode of Jeopardy!, usually on videotape so she can cut the commercials out.

email John August at august@primenet.com