Summer 2008

English Professor A Double Winner on "Jeopardy!"

Richard House’s knowledge of literature, show business, sports and other trivia made the Rose-Hulman English professor a two-night champion on the popular nationally syndicated “Jeopardy!” television game show this spring.

Knowing that the Emmy Award represented the “muse of art” and that Toronto hosted the first baseball World Series game played outside the U.S., House correctly answered the Final Jeopardy category – in the form of a question, of course – to defeat four challengers by a slim $5 margin over the course of two shows, broadcast on April 3-4. He lost on April 7 when he mistakenly thought that Diego Rivera had assassinated Pablo Picasso instead of Russian leader Leon Trotsky in the show’s final question.

“It was a fun experience,” stated House, who won more than $45,000 for his efforts. “When you’re out there on that set and the theme music starts, it’s a pretty intense experience.”

The segments were taped in December in California -– three weeks before Richard’s wife, Traci, gave birth to the couple’s first child, Sophia. Her college trust fund will reap the game show treasures. “Jeopardy!” host Alex Trebek commended House for putting the show over the impending birth.

“You put ‘Jeopardy!’ ahead of your wife and baby... Good for you,” teased Trebek.

On the April 3 show, House’s knowledge of literature came in handy in the Literature Puzzles Me category, correctly figuring out puzzles about Catcher in the Rye and Howard’s End. Then, on April 4, he scored $3,000 on a Double Jeopardy Plays and Playwrights question about Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot Play.

Other categories over the course of House’s “Jeopardy!” appearances included 10 Letter Words, Questions From a 1927 Quiz Book, “I” Pod and Who Might Have Said It?

House teaches courses in technical communications and contemporary American fiction.