2003 Trivia Champion of Melrose - Horace Mann Maniacs with Coordinator of Volunteers, Emily Rubenstein

2ND ANNUAL TRIVIA BEE - 2003

Teams of three people representing Melrose clubs, schools, businesses, non-profit organizations, governmental groups and families competed to become the Trivia Champions of 2003.

Master of Ceremonies Tug Yourgrau kept the evening running smoothly, and Trivia Wizard Phil Kukura asked the questions during the six exciting preliminary rounds. And finally, there was the Championship Round to name the three Trivia Experts in Melrose for 2003.

Not a sound could be heard from the audience as team members, local people who possess lots of useful and useless knowledge, responded to each question posed by the Wizard. Team members could choose a 10-, 20-, or 30-point question. With each question, team members could confer for 20 seconds before announcing their answer to the officials. Contestants had to be skillful at answering questions in addition to paying attention to their score and the scores of all the other teams in the round.

How did team members know if they had answered correctly? There was no question when Killer Bee Amy Spollett, Melrose's Grande Dame banged the gong for each wrong answer.

Amy Spollett - The Keeper of the Gong and Buzzing Bee Extraordinaire!

As the evening progressed Memorial Hall was filled with friendly competition and old-fashioned good fun. As they were eliminated, team members found new groups to cheer for among the successful teams.

Judges Joe Andrews, David Hall, Dennis Kelley, and Rosemary Leblanc-Considine were there to be sure that team members responded to questions within the required time and to handle any issues with the rules.

The Championship Round proved to be a tough contest for The Rotary Trivia Bees, sponsored by the Melrose Rotary Club, The Bee-lievers, sponsored by The First Congregational Church, The Massbank Money-Bees, sponsored by Massbank, The Smart Sox sponsored by Johnnie's Foodmaster, The Chamber of Knowledge, sponsored by The Melrose Chamber of Commerce, and the Horace Mann Maniacs sponsored by the Horace Mann PTO. Ultimately, The Horace Mann Maniacs were victorious, winning this year's bounteous basket of bee things.

Of course, the evening's big winner was The Bridge: A School/Community and The Melrose Public Schools. The money raised goes entirely to support The Bridge and its on-going activities. As a result of The Bridge's volunteer program members of the community have tutored students, helped in computer labs, worked in special elementary school reading programs, worked in school libraries, augmented curriculum by presenting talks or demonstrations, participated in Melrose Community Reading Days, and assisted in myriad tasks that might otherwise have taken valuable teacher and staff time.

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