The Great World War
II Test Answers
1.
How did the Quonset hut get its name?
They were made at Quonset Point, RI.
2.
What was it modeled after? They were fashioned
after the earlier British Nissen hut.
3. In
World War II, what were replacement depots called by the GIs?
They were fondly
referred to as "repple depples."
4.
What were the three squadrons that participated in the Ploiesti raid?
The 67th Bombardment
Squadron, the 329th and the 409th.
5.
What was the last major U.S. warship sunk in World War II?
On July 30, 1945, the
cruiser Indianapolis was sunk by a Japanese submarine. Not many people were told of the ship's
sinking because it was not known to be at sea: It had just completed a
top-secret mission, delivering the first atomic bomb to Tinian in the Marianas.
6.
True or false. The five Sullivan
brothers went down with their ship.
False. On November 13,
1942, they were crew members on the USS Juneau when a Japanese submarine
hit the cruiser amidships with a torpedo.
Navy propaganda said that they went down with the ship. But actually one of the brothers managed to
get into rubber life rafts with some 140 other members of the crew. They were
adrift at sea for many days. Only ten of the crew survived; the others died of
thirst and exposure.
7.
What was the first American aircraft carrier to be sunk in World War II?
The USS Lexington
was sunk May 8, 1942, in the Battle of Coral Sea. Attacked by Japanese aircraft, it was hit by two torpedoes and
three bombs. The ensuing fires below
decks were out of control and the ship was abandoned. 2700 seamen were rescued; 216 were killed.
8. Who actually sunk her?
After the Lexington
was abandoned, the destroyer Phelps fired two torpedoes to sink her.
9.
What do the letters for the personnel carrier DUKW stand for?
D=Year of design
(1942)
U=Amphibian
K=All wheel drive
W=Dual rear axles
10. Where was the
Russian T-34 tank designed?
Although built in the
USSR, the T-34 tank was designed in the United States.
11. What were the
"screaming meemies?"
The
"screaming meemies" were rockets fired from a nebelwerfer, a
six-barreled rocket launcher whose bombs wailed as they flew through the air.
12. What was the
first European city to be liberated in World War II, and by whom?
Tver (formerly known as Kalinin), Russia was liberated by
the Russian Army on December 16, 1941 led by Marshal Georgi K. Zhukov.
The first city in Western Europe: The British 8th Army under Montgomery took Syracuse, Sicily (on the eastern side of
the island) relatively unopposed on the 10th and the American 7th Army under Patton took Gela, Sicily (on the western side of
the island) also on the 10th. If you said Palermo, Sicily on July 23, 1943 by Patton we'll give you credit. :O)
13. On whose grave
marker is inscribed, "At This Spot the 77th Infantry Division Lost a
Buddy. [FILL IN NAME]. 18 April
1945."? Ernie Pyle.
14. What was the GIs
reply to the British saying, "The trouble with you Yanks is that you're
overpaid, oversexed, and over here."?
"You're sore
because you're underpaid, undersexed, and under Eisenhower."
15. What did the
letters "WOW" stand for? Woman Ordinance
Worker.
16. What was the
first U.S. all-black division formed in World War II?
93rd Infantry Division.
17. Who was
"Rosie the Riveter" named after?
The term was
named after an actual factory worker named Rosina Bonavita. The term caught on
and was immortalized in song.
18. What was the name
of the first liberty ship launched? S.S. Patrick Henry
19. What was the name
of the last liberty ship launched? S.S. Benjamin Warner
20. What company had
the largest tank factory in the U.S.? Chrysler
21. How many tanks
were produced at this factory?
Chrysler produced
25,000 tanks during the war.
22. Who was the first
Allied soldier killed in action on D-Day?
Leutenant
"Den" Brotheridge, a glider troop of the British Airborne
"Pathfinders", was killed taking their objective, "Pegasus
Bridge", near Rainville, France.
They were successful in capturing the bridge intact which was essential
for the Allied invasion force to break out of the Normandy beachhead.
23. Who were the
first three U.S. generals to land in Normandy?
Maj. Gen. Matthew
B. Ridgway, Commander 82nd Airborne Div.; Brig. Gen. James M. Gavin, Assistant
Division Commander 82nd Airborne; and Maj. Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor, Commander
101st Airborne.
24. What was the
Japanese signal to put Operational Order Number 1 into effect?
On December 2,
1941, the Japanese Imperial Command sent the signal, "Climb Mount
Niitaka" to set in motion the attack on Pearl Harbor.
25. What was
"Axis Sally's" real name? Mildred Elizabeth
(Midge) Gillars
26. Where was she
from? Native of Portland,
Maine. Student at Ohio Wesleyan.
27. What did the GIs
call her?
"The Bitch of Berlin" to the Americans and less crudely
"The Bride of Lord Haw-Haw" (William Joyce) to the British.
28. What happened to
her after the war?
She was tried and
convicted of treason and served 12 years in a federal reformatory. After her release, she went on to teach
music in Columbus, Ohio. In 1988, she
died at the age of 87.
29. What breed of dog
did Eisenhower get in early 1944? A Scottie puppy.
30. What was its
name? Telek.
31. What was it named
after?
A country cottage
called "Telegraph Cottage" where Eisenhower set up Supreme
Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force near London.
32. How much did
Eisenhower smoke? Four packs of Camel
(non-filtered) per day.
33. What did the term
"FLAK" come from?
The name for
antiaircraft fire came from the German "Flieger Abweher Kanone."
34. What U.S. Navy
submarine sank the most Japanese tonnage (100,231 tons) of any
U.S. submarine in
World War II? The U.S.S. Flasher.
35. What Hollywood
actor served as communications officer on the aircraft carrier
U.S.S. Lake
Champlain in the closing days of the war.
Jack Lemmon.
36. What aircraft
carrier was nicknamed "the Blue Ghost?"
U.S.S. Lexington
(CV-16) which replaced the original U.S.S. Lexington (CV-2) which was
sunk. CV-16 was the only carrier not
painted in camouflage colors.
37. Who coined the
term "The Longest Day" for D-Day?
Field Marshall Erwin Rommel.
38. What was
"Mary Q?" The name of General
Omar Bradley's personal C-47.
39. What was the only
American college to lose its entire 1940-1941 eleven-man football team in World
War II? Montana State.
40. What was the
first commodity to be rationed by the U.S. in World War II? Rubber.
41. What was
"Pink Lady?"
Torpedo fluid that PT
boat crews drained and distilled into 190 proof alcohol, which they then mixed
with grapefruit juice to make a potent drink.
42. What was
"Roosevelt Sausage?"
A nickname the
Russians gave to Spam, which was shipped to them in tremendous quantities
throughout World War II as a part of Lend-Lease.
43. What slogan was
made famous by Reader's Digest magazine and used in the 1942 movie Wake
Island? "There are no
atheists in foxholes."
44. Who did President
Gerald Ford pardon on his last day in office on January 19, 1977?
Iva Ikuo Toguri
d'Aquino, an American citizen, better known as "Tokyo Rose."
45. Who is the only
person ever to receive two Oscars for the same role?
Harold Russell
received two Oscars for his role as the handicapped sailor, Homer Parrish, in
the 1946 movie The Best Years of Our Lives....one for Best Supporting
Actor and one an honorary award.
46. Who invented the
amphibious D.U.K.W.?
Hartley Rowe, chief
engineer for the United Fruit Company.
47. What did
"NATO" stand for in World War II?
North African Theater of Operations.
48. How many nations
made up the Allies in World War II? 46.
49. What was an
"Accolade Certificate?"
An Accolade
Certificate was a document sent to the next-of-kin of a serviceman who was
killed in action or who died in the performance of his duties.
50. What singer was
voted most popular by GIs overseas during World War II?
Roy Acuff. Frank Sinatra was second.
51. What was "Admiral
Q?"
It was the code name
for President Franklin D. Roosevelt while he was en route to the Casablanca
Conference in 1943.
52. What did U.S.
Airborne troops have that no other parachute troops in the world had?
Reserve parachutes.
53. What was
"Allied V-2?" The nickname given by
the press to USO singer Dinah Shore.
54. What was the
"Aluminum Trail?"
The nickname for the
air route over the Himalayas from India to China because of the high number of
planes that crashed.
55. What was the
Amagiri?
The Japanese destroyer
that rammed and sank Lt. John F. Kennedy's PT-109. After Kennedy was elected President of the United States, the
captain of the Amagiri sent him a note of apology!
56. What was known as
the "Battle of Flowers?"
The "Anschluss" or the Nazi annexation of Austria on March
13, 1938, due to the tremendous welcome the German forces received.
57. What was
"Ashcan?"
The code name for the American detention center at Mondorf-les-Bains,
Luxembourg, established to hold high-ranking Germans. The British equivalent was called "Dustbin."
58.
What was Atlantico? The name of
Mussolini's white stallion.
59. Where, and on
what date, and under whose command was the U.S. Eighth Air Force
activated? Savannah, Georgia,
January 28, 1942, under Brig. General Asa N. Duncan.
60. Which U.S. Division was the first of all Allied units to set foot
on German soil and to penetrate the Siegfried Line?
5th Armored Division. At 1630 hours on September 11, 1944, a few
members of the 2nd Platoon, Troop B, 85th Cavalry Sq. crossed into Germany at
Stolzembourg. The reconnaissance patrol
consisted of Sgt. Warner W. Holzinger, Cpl. Ralph E. Diven, T/5 Coy T. Locke,
Pfc. William McColligan, Pfc. George F. McNeal and Pfc. Jesse Stevens.
61. What were
"Married Companies?" (long
answer)
The "A" tank companies and "A" infantry companies
were paired off. Likewise paired were
the "B" companies and the "C" companies. Within the companies, each infantry platoon
of five squad-halftracks was paired with a platoon of five medium tanks. Within the platoons, each medium tank crew
of five men was paired with its own infantry squad of twelve men. The final result of the "marriage"
was a Sherman tank, a halftrack and 17 men who were to eat, sleep and fight
together.
62. Who told General
George C. Marshall, "The people of China, of the Philippines, of the Dutch
East Indies will be watching us. They
may excuse failure but they will not excuse abandonment."?
Dwight D. Eisenhower,
concerning the fall of the Philippines to the Japanese.
63. What was
"L" and where was it located?
"L" was the
designator of the largest Japanese espionage ring in the world. It was located in Mexico City.
64. What was the name
of the song written by Irving Berlin for the U.S. Navy Relief and introduced by
Kate Smith in 1942? I Threw a Kiss in the
Ocean
65. What was the
"FFI"? French Forces of the
Interior, part of the French Resistance.
66. What was a
"limpet"?
A time delayed mine
that could be attached to the hull of a ship by magnets.
67. Emperor Hirohito
would often read what American magazine while in his air raid shelter in
Tokyo? National Geographic Magazine
68. Who was Nazi
party member number 8672? Joseph Goebbels.
69. What was the
"Magic Carpet Fleet?"
The name given to
the U.S. Navy carriers that were used at the end of World War II to transport
servicemen back to the States.
70. What cartoon character
was classified 4F, unfit for military service, for faulty vision?
No, it wasn't Mr.
Magoo, it was Superman.
71. What were the
four freedoms President Franklin D. Roosevelt listed in his State of the Union
speech on January 6, 1941?
Freedom of Speech and
Expression
Freedom of Religion
Freedom from Want
Freedom from Fear
72. What was the name
of FDR's private railroad car and how much did he pay for it?
Ferdinand Magellan
cost FDR one dollar.
73. What was
"klim?"
The name given to
powdered milk by American forces. It's
milk spelled backwards.
74. What were the
five neutral European countries during World War II?
Switzerland, Sweden,
Spain, Portugal, and Ireland.
75. What was called
the "Achilles Heel" of the American defense in World War II?
The Panama Canal.
76. Who was the only
German woman to receive the Iron Cross First Class in World War II?
Hanna Reitsch.
77. What two Nazi war
criminals repented their crimes before their deaths?
Hans Frank while
imprisoned at Nuremberg and Reinhard Heydrich as he lay dying in 1942.
78. What was
"Washing Machine Charlie?"
A Japanese
aircraft that flew over Guadalcanal every night at 0330 hours to drop a single
bomb on U.S. Marines.
Who said....?:
1.
"Once war is forced on us, there is no alternative than to apply
every available means to bring it to a swift end. War's very object is victory---not prolonged indecision."
General Douglas
MacArthur.
2.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat
it." George Santayana.
3.
"If we have the power, we'll never give it up again unless we're
carried out of our offices as corpses."
Joseph Goebbels
4.
"I have seen war....I hate war." Franklin D. Roosevelt 14 August
1936.
5.
"I saw my enemies at Munich, and they are worms." Adolf Hitler.
6.
"Hit hard, hit fast, hit often." Admiral William Halsey.
7.
"If a man starts a war, he must have the nerve to bear the
consequences."
General Kurt Zeitzler.
8.
"No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb
bastard die for his country."
General George Patton.
9.
"We proved that the antidote to racism is excellence in
performance."
Lt. Col. Herbert
Carter.
10. "[Roosevelt] lied us into war because
he did not have the political courage to lead us into it." Congresswoman Claire Boothe Luce, 1944
campaign.