United States of America (44). Switzerland (13). Canada (12). Spain (11). Italy (9*). Germany (9).
Finland, France, and Sweden (8 each). Austria and Japan (6 each). Hungary and the Netherlands (5 each).
Great Britain (4*). Argentina, Norway, Russia, Turkey (4 each). Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Cuba, Egypt, Greece (3 each). Mexico, Slovakia, South Korea (2 each).
Andorra, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, China, Georgia, Ireland, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Pakistan, Poland, Puerto Rico, Qatar, Serbia, South Africa, Thailand (1 each).
All other nations (zero). For now.
In the event of national name or boundary changes, the present-day nations are used.
My first thought was Olympic Gold Medals for (particular sport)… but then thought that Russia and/or Germany would have asterisks instead of Italy and Great Britain.
Then, for some reason, my brain thought “maybe it’s Nobel Prizes in (particular thing), then”.
The humorous answer could be “wars won (or tied)” but the US would need an asterisk.
I keep getting hung up on the US having 44 presidents.
And 44 states. (Right, like Wyoming’s a real place.)
Grover Cleveland traditionally gets counted as both no. 22 and no. 24 (he even gets two coins), but he was really the same guy all along, so one could argue the US has had 43 Presidents, not 44.
Or, if you include the Presidents of the United States in Congrefs Assembled during the Articles of Confederation, it gets up to about 50 different people.
Yes! Yes! Grover Cleveland was one one person, so we have had 43 presidents; a man who is the president is not the same as a term-of-office presidency. To confuse the two is symptomatic of the kind of fuzzy thinking that, uh, that… Um, what was the question again?
I would argue that we have had 38 Presidents, not 44.
I would remove Tyler, Fillmore, Johnson 17, Arthur, Cleveland 24, and Ford from the list.
My guess is that this has something to do with buildings.
I’m surprised to see that Andorra has one (whatever it is) — I was under the impression that Andorra has nothing.
And Italy’s asterisk is that the Leaning Tower counts by length but not altitude. The UK’s is that Stonehenge counted before Spinal Tap.
Why in the hell would Italy *AND* GB have an asterisk but not the US?
I WANT AN ASTERISK.
No, you don’t. Trust me on this.
Don’t be so paternalistic. If the man says he wants an asterisk then he wants an asterisk — give it to him*.
* Just make sure he signs the Terms of Acceptance Form. It’s his funeral.
And… I think now that the answer has something to do with nationally registered corporations.
My every thought has been Olympic medals; so here’s a stab at it: Total Olympic medals (gold, silver and bronze) in wrestling.
Iran just got a silver and two bronze medals in freestyle and 3 golds in Greco-Roman in just this year’s Olympics alone and isn’t on the list.
Number of non-Hispanic white male inhabitants that know how to dance.
(nah, it’s just interesting that Puerto Rico is counted separately, can’t remember if that’s the usual standard or not.) (I think it’s not, because iirc it’s normally UN member states for global lists, unless otherwise stated)
Yeah, it turns out I’m not so good at the UN thing. Not really necessary in this case.
Not to worry — the UN isn’t so good at the UN thing, either.
Tuesday hint: President Obama would much rather the list had opened at “United States of America (43).”
Number of major economic downturns in the past two centuries?
I was thinking something along the lines of “years in recession since creation of a central bank,” but then that doesn’t explain the low number for the UK. I’m still stumped.
Number of citizens named Mitt Romney?
Wednesday hint: Jaybird and Randy Harris are right to be thinking about the Olympics. But this list has nothing to do with winning medals.
Banned athletes? With the asterisks being athletes who had their bans overturned?
Something about hosting the Olympics? Germany doesn’t have an asterisk so the asterisk is not something about “terrorist attacks”…
Number of unsuccessful bids to host the olympics?
Can’t be that, because there have only been something like 20-30 total Olympic Games.
Randy Harris is (once again) spot on. After seeing how elaborate London 2012 was, you’ve gotta hand it to places like Andorra and Kazakhstan for even being willing to say “Yeah, we can totally do this.”
And the asterisk?
Olympics awarded but not held, because of war. Told you that you didn’t want an asterisk.
Golly.
My first guess for the asterisk was successful bids for Olympics that weren’t held, but Wiki says that 1940 was awarded to Finland.
Assists should go the Jaybird for being first to mention “Olympics” and “hosting.”
And 1916 in Germany, so I don’t understand where Brut’s asterisks come from.
I do the best I can, often after casting about for various ideas for longer amounts of time than I spend on any blogproject other than my Great Cases posts. So mistakes maybe get made.
Come up with some of these on your own and we’ll be thrilled to run them.
Not meant as a criticism. I assume you have other sources of information. Which Olympics didn’t Italy and the UK get?
Rome in 1908, and London in 1944. Berlin 1916 was an oversight on my part.
Please do consider a guest puzzle!
Aha. And Finland in 1940 is yet another. It hadn’t occurred to me that they were awarded far enough in advance for 1944, and I’d never heard about 1908.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1908_Summer_Olympics#Background
Italian authorities were preparing to hold the games when Mount Vesuvius erupted on 7 April 1906, devastating the city of Naples. Funds were diverted to the reconstruction of Naples, so a new venue was required.
I’ll give a puzzle some thought.
Apologies if I came off as overly testy before. Not really aimed at you, man.
No worries.
Again, I am in awe of both The Puzzler and The Puzzled. Props all around.
Yeah, +1 to what Tom said. Nothing makes me feel stupid in a fun way like Monday Trivia.
Well played, Randy. I see it is not uncommon for countries, or the US at least, to submit multiple cities during the bidding process. I assumed the countries themselves bid and put forth a city. Whoops!