There was a variety of press material sent out by both 20th Century Fox and CBS to promote M*A*S*H. There were actor biographies, episode previews, season previews, feature stories, press kits, and more. One of the more unique materials that was sent out by Fox was M*A*S*H trivia. The trivia press release was sent multiple times over the years, and they’d add more questions as the seasons went on. This “M*A*S*H Trivia Time” release is undated, but based on the trivia questions asked, we can tell it was released as M*A*S*H beginning it’s ninth season, so that would place it in 1980. The questions in the press release range in difficulty, and it was a fun way for Fox to provide information that the media could use in stories about M*A*S*H‘s upcoming season. Let’s take a look at M*A*S*H trivia and see how we do!
This 1980 press release has the questions and answers for 58 trivia questions across six pages, and there is a varying degree of difficulty. Some of the questions are fairly easy including questions about Radar’s home state, the name of B.J.’s daughter, the name of Col. Potter’s horse, and Charles’s full name. However, there are some questions that proved to be more difficult because they aren’t M*A*S*H related, but they are questions about the actors themselves. One of those questions is, “Harry Morgan, M*A*S*H‘s Col. Potter, starred in seven television series before M*A*S*H. Name ’em.” Maybe that would have been an easy questions to answer in 1980, but today, there are several shows that I had to look up on IMDb! (Incidentally, the shows were: Dragnet, Pete and Gladys, The D.A., December Bride, Hec Ramsey, Kentucky Jones, and The Richard Boone Show.) The release also lists the contact as Chuck Panama, who had a long career as a publicist in Hollywood (learn more about Panama in this post).
Trivia questions were a fun way to help promote M*A*S*H during its run in the 1980s. I read through the questions before writing the post, and I really didn’t find any factual errors; however, I did notice that McLean Stevenson’s name is spelled incorrectly a few times. There are a few tricky questions including one about Father Mulcahy’s rank (it changed in season eight)! I have similar releases from later seasons with more trivia questions, including one in the Season 10 Press Kit, but this is the earliest trivia release in my collection. I think this is a clever way to help publicize M*A*S*H as publications could use the questions and answers in articles or trivia pages.
The M*A*S*H Historian 