Knowledge after hours

The answer was “mutton chops,” in response to a question asking for the name of the beard style worn by Wolverine, John Quincy Adams, and a few other notable figures.

It’s a Tuesday night in downtown Los Alamos, when trivia turns Boese Brew Company into a focused blend of competitive encyclopedic recall and deductive reasoning. In a town known worldwide for scientific achievement, knowledge-flexing—even in the facial-hair domain—is part of the atmosphere.

Cold, crisp air hangs outside, but inside, the bright bulbs cast a warm glow over the packed tables, where teams of up to six squeeze into every available space. Alexandra, the quizmaster, sits at the bar reading questions into a microphone from her laptop. The drink menu above her offers Dr. Strangehop IPA, and to the menu’s right hangs a framed drawing of a guy riding a Fat Man–style atomic bomb, cowboy hat raised in the air.

Whenever a team wins the trickiest bonus question in a round, someone threads through the crowd to reach Alexandra and collect the prizes (Boese merchandise) for their team. The classic eight-questions-per-round, seven-round format of Geeks Who Drink—the company providing the quiz—fills about two hours. At the end of the night, the top three teams receive Boese gift cards to reward their well-honed memory powers and encourage future participation. 

When asked to describe the typical winning team, Alexandra pauses. “It’s usually a mixture of people with different backgrounds,” she says. “The questions cover such a broad mix of topics that it really helps when a team’s knowledge is spread across different areas.”

Players on the frequently winning team The Great Outdoors echo the idea. As Tuesday night regulars, they’re part of a core group of trivia devotees who return week after week. “Trivia hits every category you can think of, so we do well because we all bring something different to the table,” says Emily, a geophysicist at an environmental services company. Her teammates Ivan, an accountant at a nearby Pueblo, and Michael, a procurement specialist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, nod as she speaks.

The weekly celebration of obscure facts points to a deeper truth: Like the modern science performed at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where specialists coordinate across disciplines, trivia success depends less on individual brilliance and more on collaboration. From facial-hair taxonomy and 19th-century politics to cutting-edge physics, correct answers emerge when different pockets of knowledge converge. ★