The second annual May the 4th Be With You Trivia Quiz and Prize Draw Fundraising Event held this last week by the Space Hipsters Facebook group was a resounding success.
The live online event was hosted by Space Hipsters Emily Carney and Lois Huneycutt, and opened with a special prize draw for children, with ten special prize lots being given out to the lucky winners.
This was followed by guest appearances from former astronauts Robert “Hoot” Gibson and Fred Haise, along with author Bruce McCandless III, and of course our very own Czarina Salido.
The Trivia Quiz section of the event was run by Steve Sherman, and the questions – a mixture of space and Star Wars trivia – were both challenging and fun for the participants. Steve handled the challenges of running the live quiz with his usual nerves of steel, and the leader board changed constantly as the contestants battled for glory.
The magnificent trophy for the Trivia Quiz Champion – a talking Jar Jar Binks doll – was won last year by musician and podcaster Dave Giles. Dave was unable to join the event to defend his title, but after guarding the precious trophy for the past year he will now be sending it on to the new Galactic Champion – Larry Puzio!
Finally, the eagerly-anticipated prize draws allowed everyone who had donated to the event to have an equal chance of winning one of the 13 prize lots that had been assembled from gifts sent in by generous Space Hipster donors plus some special donations received from former astronauts Fred Haise, Hoot Gibson and Rhea Seddon, and Harrison Schmitt.
Special mention this year has to go Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt and his wife Teresa Fitzgibbon, who donated the star prize of the event – an Apollo 17 beta cloth mission patch that was actually flown to the moon on the Apollo 17 mission in December 1972!
Having this wonderful piece of memorabilia as a prize certainly contributed to the amazing success of this year’s event, which brought in over $4,000 in donations to Taking Up Space.
Taking Up Space would like to take this opportunity to thank Emily Carney, Lois Huneycutt, and Steve Sherman for running the live event, and to thank Hoot Gibson, Fred Haise, and Bruce McCandless III for their guest appearances. Also, huge thanks everyone who donated prizes for the event, and of course to all the Space Hipsters who donated to participate in the event.
