Yesterday a Hammett clew made a reprise appearance on Jeopardy! as they mined their archives to fill in the weeks of summer with From the Vault: Million Dollar Masters.
If I heard right, this tournament rounding up previous champions was the first time the show offered a purse of one million dollars for the winner. When the episode originally aired on May 8, 2002, that was pretty serious money. Not bad today, but you can do better.
In the Jeopardy! Round, $1000 clew in the category Strain Thy Brain:
In the 16th C., it was the unusual annual rent paid by the Knights of Malta to Holy Roman Emperor Charles V
Man. Talk about easy.
Not one of the three eggheads of yesteryear buzzed in with a guess!
Morons.
A look of disappointment seemed to cross Alex Trebek’s face.
He gave them the info: “And that was. . . the real Maltese Falcon.”
Of course it was.
