"The United States built the Panama Canal" greatly oversimplifies the whole construction story. The US was certainly a major and influential player, but a lot of non-US lives were lost in the construction. At least 4500 West-Indian workers died in the American construction and unknown thousands more during the French phase.
And yet I have no doubt that you knew the correct answer. "Certainly a major and influential player" makes it sound like this was in some way a multinational effort, which it was not. It was entirely led and directed by the United States despite the earlier failure by France to build the canal.
After the French made moderate progress on the canal, "The US relied on a stratified workforce to build the canal. High-level engineering jobs, clerical positions, skilled labor and jobs in supporting industries were generally reserved for Americans, with manual labor primarily by cheap immigrant labor. These jobs were initially filled by Europeans, primarily from Spain, Italy and Greece, many of whom were radical and militant due to political turmoil in Europe. The US then decided to recruit primarily from the British and French West Indies, and these workers provided most of the manual labor on the canal." So the US ran the show, but it is disingenuous to say "they built it". "The US led the second building effort of the Panama Canal" would be closer to the truth.
Calling what the French did "moderate progress" is more disingenuous than just saying the Americans did it all by themselves. The French attempt was a total failure. The design of the canal they were trying to make was unworkable. The amount of Earth they moved was a tiny fraction of what was eventually required to finish the job. From 1881-1889 they managed to kill 22,000 workers, spend close to $300 million USD, and go bankrupt. When the US acquired the land for the canal from the French, they had to basically rebuild everything, come up with a completely new design, and, while, yes, the majority of the laborers employed came from the West Indies (specifying British and French West Indies serves what purpose here? Trying to give more credit to Europeans for having colonial empires that contained people?), there were over 11,000 Americans who worked on the project, too. The 1st attempt was such a catastrophic failure it seems like not mentioning it at all is kinder to the French.
Would you take issue with a quiz that identified the United Arab Emirates as building the Palm Jumeirah since the large majority of the laborers who worked on this project were not Emirati (most were Indian or Pakistani; a much more significant portion, in fact, than the number of laborers on the Panama Canal from the West Indies)?
Does this mean that we should say India built these structures in Dubai? Or does that sound weird since we're diverting attention and credit away from a country other than the United States?
kalba's usual fake outrage notwithstanding, the point was not that the French built the Panama canal, but that it would be fair to give credit not only to the Americans who ran the show, but also to the people of many nationalities who did the actual heavy lifting - and yes, I agree that one should apply the same logic to buildings in Qatar and the UAE.
The U.S. Department of Treasury website says: "U.S currency is produced by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and U.S. coins are produced by the U.S. Mint."
One of the definitions of "currency" in the 10th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary is "paper money in circulation".
By these definitions, the Susan B. Anthony and Sacagawea coins we're familiar with wouldn't count.
Is there a less ambiguous way to phrase Question 12?
I honestly do not see the issue with the current wording as the definition above the one you listed (2b) says: "2a: something (such as coins, treasury notes, and banknotes) that is in circulation as a medium of exchange".
This definition explicitly provides coins as an example.
I kind of agree with cpgatbyu. The term "currency" is misleading, connotating if not denoting a strictly paper medium, and this could be considered a "trick question". I think that "legal tender" would be a more thoroughly-encompassing term. I answered the question incorrectly according to the quiz-maker's parameters, although I knew fully well that Susan B. Anthony was one woman who appeared on U.S. legal tender. I thought it was a trick question and I answered it based on what I thought the trick was - to pay attention to the usage of the term "currency", connotating only paper currency.
Doesn't matter, as women have appeared on US paper currency as well, such as this and this, and if we're including allegorical figures this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and a couple of others I don't have space to link.
I'm pretty surprised to see that this is the answer guessed wrong most-often. I thought it was well known that he was a giant of a man at the time, and tall even by today's standards. James Madison is the shortest US president in history by a full 2 inches, being only 5'4", while runners-up Benjamin Harrison and Martin van Buren were 5'6". Most American presidents have been pretty tall. 24/45, more than half, were at least 6 feet (183 cm) or taller. Though... don't believe Trump's claims of 6'3". That appears to be a lie, like everything else in his life. The man is maybe 6'0", possibly 6'1" if he took off his lift shoes and could manage to stand like a normal person
This is indeed hilarious. Thanks for the insight. I just did a little bit of digging and found this little bit of mischievous journalism:
Donald Trump’s height is officially pegged at six feet, three inches by his White House doctor. However, that official statistic appears to be another of Trump’s myriad exaggerations, if one looks at photos of Trump standing next to other tall people whose heights are also publicly known. In a group shot of G7 leaders at their 2018 meeting, Trump was placed next to host Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (six-foot-two) on the flat dais and it was impossible not to see that the American president was noticeably shorter than the PM, even as Trudeau widened his stance, as if shrinking down a bit so as to not antagonize the thin-skinned president. It was to no avail: “A tall tale?” was the Daily Mail’s headline for the Trump-Trudeau height fracas.
At the following year’s G7 photo op, Trump moved to stand next to German chancellor Angela Merkel (five-foot-five) only to be foiled by his host, French President Emmanuel Macron, who escorted him to a position near Trudeau.
Though LBJ was not the direct descendant of Andrew Johnson, they were still, surely, related. Barack Obama and Dick Cheney are 8th cousins, after all. From a couple seconds poking around online it seems John Beaufort,1st Earl of Somerset, was a direct ancestor of both men. But it's not unlikely that they shared some other kinship more recent than the 1400s.
Spain also helped with the war of independece, so GB was a fighting a Rebel Alliance of 2 world powers (indirectly) and British separatists (the concept of being American was yet to be born) with GB reluctant to send troops to kill British subjects.
Not to be overly picky (but I will be anyway!) only 19 people were executed due to the Salem witch trials. The twentieth person, Giles Corey, was tortured to death in an effort to make him plead either "guilty" or "not guilty." I know it's basically an academic distinction since he was killed anyway, but it was an important one at the time. By refusing to enter a plea, he prevented them from putting him on trial, which would have led to his conviction regardless of his plea (though a "guilty" plea probably would've saved his life), which in turn would've led to the government seizing his estate. Without the trial and conviction, his estate passed to his chosen heirs according to his will. Had he been executed -- i.e., tried, convicted, and sentenced to death -- his heirs would've been left with nothing.
Oh, and the method they used to torture him was pressing: placing a board over his body and then piling rocks on top of it. Reportedly, he never once cried out during the whole process, only ever speaking to ask for "more weight," which are said to have been his last words.
Some questions can't be both true and false: The Panama Canal was mostly built by French before some speculation ends up the project, which was later taken under USA's control while France ran into WWI. As well everything's not clear about the Rosenbergs, there's still some dark details about them, and refer them as Russian spies, moreover for Ethel, is rather biased as she never show a real attract to the USSR nor an anti-patriotic behaviour.
Does this mean that we should say India built these structures in Dubai? Or does that sound weird since we're diverting attention and credit away from a country other than the United States?
One of the definitions of "currency" in the 10th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary is "paper money in circulation".
By these definitions, the Susan B. Anthony and Sacagawea coins we're familiar with wouldn't count.
Is there a less ambiguous way to phrase Question 12?
This definition explicitly provides coins as an example.
Donald Trump’s height is officially pegged at six feet, three inches by his White House doctor. However, that official statistic appears to be another of Trump’s myriad exaggerations, if one looks at photos of Trump standing next to other tall people whose heights are also publicly known. In a group shot of G7 leaders at their 2018 meeting, Trump was placed next to host Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (six-foot-two) on the flat dais and it was impossible not to see that the American president was noticeably shorter than the PM, even as Trudeau widened his stance, as if shrinking down a bit so as to not antagonize the thin-skinned president. It was to no avail: “A tall tale?” was the Daily Mail’s headline for the Trump-Trudeau height fracas.
:)