Richard's Stumpers

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11 #12 #13 #14 #15 #16 #17 #18 #19 #20 #21 #22 #23 #24

Set #24

  1. Our friends, John, Bill, Dick, Carolyn, Maryann, and Joan paired off and were married last summer. They are all keen on sports. John was captain of the school football team, Bill is a star basketball player, and Dick is a keen swimmer. Rather surprisingly however, Dicks wife cannot swim. Carolyn, who has a good eye for a ball, plays golf as her chief sport. Maryann, who is Dicks sister, is a good dancer and Joan, whose husband is very short, is an expert diver. Can you work out who is married to whom?

  2. Johnny has 132 coins (nickels and pennies) in his piggy bank. If he had 9 more nickels and 29 fewer pennies, the number of each coin would than be equal. How many of each coin does Johnny really have ?

  3. Jones is 2 times as old as his son. If his sons age plus 81 years equals twice Jones age, how old are each?

  4. Say each person living had 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great-grandparents, and so on. That is to say, one generation ago he had 2 ancestors. Two generations ago he had 4 or 2 x 2 or 2 squared ancestors and so on. Three generations ago he had 8 or 2 x 2 x 2 or 2 cubed ancestors. In general, N generations ago he had 2 to the nth power ancestors. Now suppose we assume there are 30 years in a generation. Then only 600 years ago, or 20 generations back, each of us had 2 to the 20th power or 1,040,400 ancestors! Someone once used this argument to prove that 600 years ago there were over a million times as many people on Earth as there are now. It doesnt take a census to figure out that this is incorrect. Can you find the error?

  5. Benno Torelli, genial host at Hamptons most exclusive nightclub, was shot and killed by a racketeer gang because he fell behind in his protection payments. After considerable effort on the part of the police, five men were brought before the District Attorney, who asked them what they had to say for themselves. Each of the men made three statements, two true and one false. Their statements were:

Lefty: "I did not kill Torelli. I never owned a revolver. Spike did it."
Red: "I did not kill Torelli. I never owned a revolver. The other guys are all passing the buck."
Dopey: "I am innocent. I never say Butch before. Spike is guilty."
Spike: "I am innocent. Butch is the guilty man. Lefty lied and he said I did it."
Butch: "I did not kill Torelli. Red is the guilty man. Dopey and I are old pals."

Whodunnit?

Answers are available with Stumper Set #1.

Answers to Stumper Set #23

  1. Ann had $.13, Bess had $.07 and Cathy had $.04.

  2. Firm B would pay $8,300 for 3 years totaling $21,840.
    Firm A would pay $7,500 for 3 years totaling $21,000.

  3. $10 Hamilton

  4. Ronnie weighs 40 pounds and Tommy weighs 48 pounds.

  5. It had the receipt in it.

  6. 2 to the 5th power times 9 squared equals 2592.

  7. Larson is the banker, Janes is the grocer, Murphy is the butcher, and Smith is the policeman.