In honor of Mother’s Day, here is a quiz on mothers! You’d better not flunk this one!
1. Which of these Biblical matriarchs was the mother of Israel (formerly known as Jacob)? Rachel; Hannah; Sarah; Rebecca.
2. A famous story by author James Baldwin tells of the mother of the Gracchi, who was rumored to be poor because she dressed simply and wore no jewels. When asked if this rumor was true, she gathered her two sons to her side and replied “No, I am not poor, for here are my jewels. They are worth more than all your gems. “ What was this mother’s name? Antonia; Claudia; Julia; Cornelia.
3. In which of these famous images is Mary, the mother of Jesus, depicted as pregnant? Our Lady of Perpetual Help; Our Lady of Grace; Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal; Our Lady of Guadalupe.
4. Which of the six wives of English sovereign Henry VIII bore him the son he longed for, and died shortly after? Catherine Parr; Catherine Howard; Anne of Cleves; Jane Seymour.
5. The name Bertha Faber is probably unfamiliar to you; however, you have probably heard this famous lullaby, which was written for her infant son Hans in 1868. “Bye Baby Bunting”; “All Through the Night”; “Brahms’ Lullaby”; “Rock-a-Bye Baby.”
6. Anna Matilda Mc Neill was the mother of this artist, whose most famous painting is a portrait of Anna. Gainsborough; Whistler; Sargent; Van Gogh.
7. Who was the first woman to be nominated for President of the U.S. by a major political party? Margaret Chase Smith; Jeanette Rankin; Francis Perkins; Victoria Chaplin Woodhull.
8. Who, for her tireless work and support of Civil Rights, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1994? Barbara Jordan; Ada Louise Huxtable; Margaret Meade; Winona Duke.
9. According to the report “Women’s Earnings in 2008,” which kind of American woman suffers least from the gender pay gap? A woman who has never married compared to a man who has never married; A mother of two compared to a father of two; A married woman with no children compared to a married man with no children; A woman aged 35-44 compared to a man aged 35-44.
10. Which African-American woman led runaway slaves to freedom via the Underground Railroad during the Civil War era? Sojourner Truth; Harriet Tubman; Ma Rainey; Lucy Stone.
ANSWERS
1. Rebecca was chosen by God to be the wife of Isaac, the son of Abraham, to whom she bore two sons; Esau and Jacob. According to Genesis 25:23, Jacob and Esau were fraternal twins; during Rebecca’s pregnancy, the two struggled within her womb. God told Rebecca “Two nations are in thy womb, and two peoples shall be separated from thy bowels; And the one people shall be stronger than the other people; And the elder shall serve the younger”. Although Esau was the elder, he lost his birthright to Jacob, who bought it from him in return for a pottage of red lentils. 2. Cornelia. Cornelia’s two “jewels”, Tiberius and Gaius Gracchus, advocated sweeping social and political reforms aimed at empowering Rome’s poorer classes of farmers and equestrians, which earned them powerful Roman nobility. 3. Our Lady of Guadalupe. The image is believed to have been miraculously imprinted upon the cloak of Juan Diego, a Chicemeca Indian convert to Christianity who claimed to have visions of the Virgin Mary on a hillside at Tepeyac in 1531. 4. Jane Seymour. Henry regarded Jane, whom he married only 12 days after the execution of Anne Boleyn, his first “true” wife. 5. Brahms Lullaby. Brahms had once been in love with Bertha and remained friends with her after their romance ended. She married Arthur Faber and, in 1868, had a son, Hans, for whom Brahms wrote the famous “Wiegenlied” (“Cradle Song”). 6. Whistler. As a young woman, Anna fell in love with Lt. George Washington Whistler, and was devastated when he fell in love with, and married, her best friend, Mary Swift. The three remained friends, and before Mary’s early death, she begged her husband to marry Anna after she was gone. Anna became the stepmother of Mary’s children and bore Whistler five more children. 7. Margaret Chase Smith was nominated at the Republican National Convention in San Francisco in 1964. 8. Barbara Jordan was the keynote speaker at the 1976 Democrat National Convention in N.Y., being the first African American to earn that distinction. 9. Women between 35 and 44 years of age on average earned 77 percent of the amount that men of the same age earned. 10. Harriet Tubman, who wore men’s clothing and carried a revolver in order to be safe while doing this dangerous work. Sources: www.trivia.com.