San Diego tricky trivia, and other trivia to amuse you

Here’s a few tricky trivia questions (some with answers) for you to amuse yourself and friends with as you make your way through your day.

Do you know what building stands at the northwest corner of Twelfth Avenue and D Street in downtown San Diego?

It would be very surprising if you did. The next time you want to give someone the ditch, tell them to meet you at Twelfth & D. Not gonna happen. Oh, they might get close, Eleventh Avenue and C, for instance, or 13th Street and E; but they’ll never find C. Nor will 12th materialize. It’s called Park Avenue, and the street between C and E is Broadway.

By the way, did you notice it’s Eleventh Avenue, but 13th Street? In downtown San Diego, the numbered streets from First to Eleventh are “Avenues”, while 13th and higher are called “Streets.” No one really knows why. We do know that Ninth Street in Poway, now an only child, number-wise, once had brothers and sisters like Eighth and Tenth Streets, part of an abandoned plan for a development on the western side of present-day Pomerado Road.

Here’s another one. Martin Van Buren was the first president not of English or Irish descent, his family having emigrated from Holland. He is also the first president born an American citizen, in 1782, in New York.

Here’s the trivia question. Andrew Jackson, who preceded Van Buren, was the last president not born in the United States; who was the last vice-president not born in any state?

The answer? Why it’s Al Gore! That’s right, Al wasn’t born in any state, he was born in the District of Columbia. If you use that one as a bar bet, make sure it’s not too rough of a bar.

John McCain, who ran for president eight years after Al Gore, also was not born in any state of the U.S. In fact, where John was born is a foreign country – now. He was born in the part of Panama formerly known as the U.S. Canal Zone, legal U.S. territory, until it was returned to Panama in 1999.