Month: June 2012

Answers to Brain Teasers

17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:

Sunday, June 2, 1912:Went to Sunday School this afternoon. Had such a time to know when to go as the clock had stopped. As a result I got there late.

Source: Kimball’s Dairy Farmer Magazine (December 15, 1911)

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

It took more effort to know what the time was in the days before electric and battery-operated clocks. Someone must have forgotten to wind (or pull the weights on) the clock.

Here are the answers to the Brain Bothers that I posted yesterday.

Brain Bothers

Transform a MULE to a PONY in four changes, one letter at a time, without transposing.

Answer: Mule, mole, pole, pone, pony

(Farm Journal, January and March, 1912)

2. What number is divisible by 2,3,4,5, and 6, with a remainder of 1 in each instance, but is divisible by 7 without a remainder?

Answer: 301

(Farm Journal, March and May, 1912)

3. Substitute a letter in the name of an American president, and make something good to eat. Do the same with an American poet with the same result.

Answer:

Taft: Tart

Poe: Pie

(Farm Journal, May and July, 1912)

Hundred-Year-Old Brain Teaser Puzzles

17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:  

Saturday, June 1, 1912:

Passing, the spring time is passing away,

May summer appear all-a-bloom,

But the brightest and fairest of the season,

Is the bright and fair month of sweet June.

Carrie was over to see me this afternoon. I am engaged in trying to solve a puzzle. I have one ninth of it to get yet and it’s a stickler.

Recent photo of Muffly farm.

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

What was the puzzle like that Grandma so challenging? I found several hundred-year-old puzzles called Brain Bothers in 1912 issues of Farm Journal.  I’ll give you the answers tomorrow.

Brain Bothers

1. Transform a MULE to a PONY in four changes, one letter at a time, without transposing.

(January, 1912)

2. What number is divisible by 2,3,4,5, and 6, with a remainder of 1 in each instance, but is divisible by 7 without a remainder?

(March, 1912)

3. Substitute a letter in the name of an American president, and make something good to eat. Do the same with an American poet with the same result.

(May, 1912)

Poem, Etc.

Grandma included a poem in the diary on the first day of each month. Carrie refers to her friend Carrie Stout.