Here are the answers to last year's quiz.

1. In 1923:

1. What spun up for the first time? [Juan de la Cierva's autogyro, the first rotary-wing aircraft to fly.]
2. What provider of sudden darkness began its operations in the Union of South Africa? [Eskom]
3. Where was a port opened, with a city to follow, just round the coast from the established ones, but with a crucial distinction of political control? [Gdynia; Gdansk was a free city under League of Nations control.]
4. Where was the British Empire Exhibition Stadium opened? [Wembley]
5. What acronymic company for the exploitation of aerial navigation conducted its first flight? [SABENA]
6. Into what was more than half of the world's available helium gathered? [USS Shenandoah]
7. Where was a deadly earthquake followed by ethnically-motivated violence? [Kantō Plain, Honshū, Japan]
8. What technology was the subject of British and American patents, a prototype in Hastings and a demonstration in the USA? [Television]
9. Where did a number of US warships run aground, in succession, at speed in heavy fog? [Honda Point]
10. What was written on the Californian real-estate advertising sign, later to become more famous in a shorter form? [Hollywoodland]

2. [Dogs]

1. Who got his name because he had clearly led a roving and adventurous life? [Ulysses, in Arabella by Georgette Heyer]
2. Whose long-standing feud led to cries of "Curse you!" and a pop song which reached #1 in Australia, #2 in the USA and #6 in the UK? [Snoopy, versus the Red Baron, song by The Royal Guardsmen in 1966]
3. Whose name was belied by his sex? [Lassie, a bitch, was played by a dog named Pal and by his male descendants even now.]
4. Who knocked over a tea-table and was immortalised in song? [Martha, Paul McCartney's Old English Sheepdog]
5. Whose devotion to duty led to a bloody and undeserved death? [Gelert, legendarily killed by his master Llywelyn when mistakenly thought to have killed the baby he had defended from a wolf.]
6. Who spent his life waiting for 1 to return home under a different name? [Argos was Odysseus/Ulysses' faithful hound who died of joy when Odysseus returned to Ithica.]
7. Who first appeared in 1922 and had a renaissance in a different form in 1962, followed by a rapid name-change? [Bonzo the Dog inspired the Bonzo Dog Dada Band, which shortly became the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band.]
8. Who was associated with the Edinburgh police and shared a name with London policemen? [Greyfriars Bobby, whose owner John Gray was a night watchman for the Edinburgh police.]
9. Whose ghost-busting adventures came about as a reaction against violence, and was originally Too Much? [Scooby-Doo was first pitched as a dog called Too Much, invented after violent shows were dropped from American children's TV.]
10. Who might have spoken but chose not to, managing to reveal a fake by pulling back a curtain? [Toto, who didn't speak for several Oz books but gave away the Wizard in the first of them.]

3. In 1823:

1. Who found the bones that turned out not to be of a lady at all (though they were decorated)? [William Buckland, and the Red Lady of Paviland.]
2. Who put together an 11-man force to protect settlers in a territory of newly-independent Mexico? [Stephen Austin; what would later become the Texas Rangers.]
3. How was Hannibal elevated into dead men's shoes? [Cardinal Annibale della Genga was elected Pope Leo XII.]
4. Who purportedly invented a sport named after its place of origin? [William Webb Ellis, rugby footbal]
5. Which stage adaptation of a recent work of science fiction opened in London? [Presumption; or, the Fate of Frankenstein, opens at the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden.]
6. What institution's new building, to handle its ever-growing collection (including a donation from the King), was begun in London? [The British Museum.]
7. Who (allegedly) took six weeks to reach civilisation after being left for dead from a grizzly attack? [Hugh Glass]
8. Which of the Gothic greats turned her last phrase? [Ann Radcliffe]
9. Where would you find the Countess Euthanasia? [Mary Shelley's novel Valperga]
10. What nonexistent island was reported near Antarctica? [New South Greenland]

4. [Sheep]

1. What were seen bleating terribly and tearing up the ground? [the Venomous Sheep in James Stephens' Irish Fairy Tales]
2. Who was best friends with Lenny and greatly opposed to Big Baz? [Derek the Sheep, The Beano]
3. Who enjoyed life in Tipperary, but was taken as far afield as Deauville? [Missy the genetically engineered sheep in One Day as a Tiger by Anne Haverty]
4. Who opened a hairdressing salon with Shaun? [Pete the Sheep by Jackie French]
5. Who presented knitting needles for oars, and sold an egg which developed very strangely? [The sheep in the wool shop, in Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There by Lewis Carroll]
6. Who was pitted against the grocer, the policeman and the Mayor? [Larry the Lamb, Toytown]
7. Who was demonically depicted when he ran for a Republican primary, and defeated (perhaps) as a result? [Tom Campbell in Carly Fiorina's campaign ad was described and depicted as a Demon Sheep]
8. What was rescued by Dick in a scene of derring-do? [A cragfast sheep in Winter Holiday by Arthur Ransome]
9. Why was nobody tied under an animal during an escape? [In order to get through the entrance to Polyphemus' cave]
10. Who wrote about a sheep-herding pig? [Dick King-Smith, The Sheep-Pig]

5. In 2023:

1. Where did what open for the first time since 1988, and for very nearly the same reason? [Turkish-Armenian border, for earthquake relief; this time for Turkey, last time for Armenia.]
2. What vessel sank in the same place as its near namesake, though after a few more voyages? [Titan submersible.]
3. Who brought a five-year event, and his own life on the road, to an end in Stockholm? [Elton John.]
4. Who came back for the fifth time to prove that more than ever he belongs in a museum? [Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny]
5. What was successfully transplanted for the first time? [A human eye, though not with any restoration of vision]
6. Of what club did India become the fourth member? [Countries that have soft-landed a spacecraft on the moon, after the USSR, USA and China.]
7. What in Ohio might have recalled European battlefields of 1915? [Phosgene, released after the East Palestine derailment.]
8. What caused the second, third and fourth largest bank collapses in US history? [Dealing with cryptocurrency.]
9. Where did at least 400 cult members die, with as many more not accounted for? [Shakahola Forest, Kenya]
10. Where did the eight-year journey of Juice begin? [Kourou, French Guinea; the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer]