From the Stevens Point Journal April 13, 2001:

32nd Trivia contest hits UW-SP next weekend

By Andrea Glyzewski
Journal staff

Eric Speckman, Stevens Point, doesn’t expect to get much sleep next weekend. That’s because he’ll be playing Trivia again this year as a member of Team Thicko. It’s a great time, Speckman said of the annual 32nd annual Trivia contest. Its a time to get everyone together again in the same place and have fun.

Trivia will be held Friday to Sunday, April 20 to 22, in Stevens Point. Registration starts Monday. The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Points radio station, 90 FM WWSP, has sponsored the 54-hour event since 1969. This year’s theme is Old Days and Marilyn Monroe is the logo. The station is expecting more than 12,000 people to participate in the contest, creating about 500 Trivia teams, said Rebecca Pollesch, station promotions director.

Speckman has been playing Trivia for eight years. His team started small, but now includes 13 members. I love the game and like the challenge of staying awake for all 54 hours, he said.

The event kicks off Friday with a 4 p.m. parade, followed by the first question at 6 p.m. The contest runs until midnight Sunday.

It’s going to be fun this year, said John Eckendorf, co-author of the trivia questions. I think it’s also going to be surprising. The theme Old Days refers to Trivia’s overall theme of what is past is trivia. The rock band Chicago also produced a song called Old Days years ago that sums up the theme, said Jim Oliva, Trivia organizer for the past 30 years.

Most hours of the contest consists of eight questions; teams have the length of two songs to answer. All teams that respond correctly are given an equal share of the 2,000 points that a question is worth, with a minimum of five points and a maximum of 500 points. The contest features two running questions in which participants search the city for clues during the running questions at 7 a.m. Saturday and Sunday. This way we get to incorporate Stevens Point in the contest, Pollesch said.

Eckendorf said music will be played all weekend. This year we’ll still play great music, and continue all what was popular before, he said. It’s just one wild weekend.