Year-End New Haven Newz Quiz

by Paul Bass | Dec 22, 2023 9:00 am

Posted to: Opinion

Note: Answers appear at the bottom of this story along with links to relevant news stories from the past year.

1) Who was doing what, where, in the above photo?
A) Undercover narc Dexter Williams made a surreptitiously recorded purchase on Alden Avenue on Jan. 5 as part of Operation Illy Face
B) Instructor William Dexter in the parking lot of New Haven Driving School on Amity Road prepared for his final class on Jan. 29
C) Noted weed blogger Dick Williams sampled the product of Let’s Grow Hartford in anticipation of its planned conversion of a vacant State Street industrial building into the city’s next legal cannabis retailer on July 4
D) Customer Rick Woods lit up on the ride home on Jan. 10 for opening day of the city’s first legal cannabis dispensary, on Whalley Avenue
E) Customer Woody Richards enjoyed his just-purchased “cigarillo” from a Whalley Avenue smoke shop on May 9

2) Name who said the following, where: “Today, the unthinkable has happened. And today, I am not amused.”
A) Building Official Bob Dillon, at the site of a June 5 Lafayette Street building collapse
B) Mayoral candidate Shafiq Abdussabur, at a February aldermanic public hearing on a proposal to drop residency requirements for certain city department head positions
C) Musician Bob Dylan outside New Haven’s Palace Theatre, where he canceled a summer concert because workers were on strike
D) Mayor Justin Elicker at a June press conference acknowledging he might have made a mistake
E) Customer Rick Woods at Artisan Vapor & CBD on Church Street, lamenting that the shop had run out of kratom one day in September

3) What sign was erected on the corner of Orange and Elm Streets on Feb. 27?
A) “Lucretia’s Corner,” honoring New Haven’s first known Black resident
B) “Welcome to Webster Hotel”
C) A message advising “turning vehicles” to “yield” to pedestrians (pictured as a walking person with head disconnected from body)
D) “WTNH: 1 BLOCK” with an arrow pointing east
E) “Slow Down!” with an image of Audrey Hepburn

4) The Greenwich Avenue and Grand Avenue C‑Towns were renamed …
A) E‑Town
B) Stop & Shop
C) Key Food
D) Elm City Foods
E) Everybody’s Market

5) What were all those cops doing in the above photo?
A) Filming a commercial for Gold’s Gym
B) Participating in a mock bomb emergency response
C) Holding a union election
D) Holding B shift roll call in College Woods Park
E) Making sure no one could get close enough to see the city bulldoze a homeless tent encampment near the Boulevard
F) Putting together a group to-go order from Koffee?

6) What restaurant was destroyed by fire on May 11?
A) Copper Kitchen
B) Abate’s
C) Tony & Lucille’s
D) Leon’s
E) Hattie’s

7) Who was doing what in the above photo?
A) Firefighter Ben Wilson participated in an aerial rescue training drill
B) Actor Ben Carney filmed a scene for an upcoming Jaigantic Studios action movie
C) Firefighter Nathaniel Peragallo transported an injured construction worker on an aerial rescue from a partial building collapse at a Lafayette Street construction site
D) Firefighter Woody Richards performed an aerial rescue following an upper-story collapse at the Knights of Columbus building

8) What was Mayor Justin Elicker doing in the above photo?
A) Signing up a voter to receive an absentee ballot for this year’s mayoral election
B) Filming a commercial for Pup-Peroni dog snacks
C) Swearing in Mugs, the NHPD’s new drug-sniffing officer
D) Swearing in Finn, the NHPD’s new comfort canine officer
E) Rehearsing his testimony for a Board of Alders hearing on a proposal to drop residency requirements for certain city department head positions

9) Which groups organized new unions in New Haven this year? (Check all that apply)
A) Ocean Management tenants
B) Resident assistants at SCSU dorms
C) Yale New Haven Hospital nurses
D) The remaining humans working at WELI AM and the New Haven Register
E) Yale graduate-student teachers

10) Where were these people embarking from, and to, for the first time?
A) Tweed-New Haven Airport to Little Rock
B) Tweed-New Haven Airport to San Juan, Puerto Rico
C) Tweed-New Haven Airport to Jacksonville, Florida
D) Union Station to Port Chester, N.Y.
E) Union Station to Jersey City, N.J.

11) Who runs the last remaining movie theater in New Haven, what’s the theater’s name; and what kind of films does it show?
A) Gilbert Grape, Pirate’s Cove; Johnny Depp Movies
B) Bob Spodick, the Lincoln Theater; “arthouse” and classic films
C) Gilberto Gonzalez, the Fairmount; porn
D) John Martin, Bradley Street Bicycle Co-op; foreign flicks
E) There is no movie theater left

12) How much did New Haven agree to pay Richard “Randy” Cox for the paralyzing injuries caused by police who arrested him and mishandled him in a transport van and at the lock-up?
A) $5 million
B) $10 million
C) $27.5 million
D) $45 million
E) $58.3 million

13) In a year when fellow Republican lawmakers in Washington criticized U.S. Rep. George Santos and kicked him out of Congress for abusing his position, making false public statements, and committing crimes, how did fellow Democratic elected officials in New Haven react to Alder Sal DeCola fleeing the scene of a crash he caused without contacting the police for days (the same day someone else identified him as a suspect), and never subsequently apologizing?
A) They criticized his actions
B) They kicked him out of office
C) They initiated a joint mayoral/alder investigation into the incident
D) They named the street where the crash took place after him
E) They renamed Nathan Hale School Alder Sal DeCola Academy
F) None of the above; the party endorsed him and activists helped reelect him

Answers to the puzzle, along with links to the relevant news stories, appear after the following podcast of a “Headlines and Basslines” segment (music and more headline talk) of WNHH FM’s“Dateline New Haven” program. (Click here to subscribe or here to listen to other episodes of Dateline New Haven.)