Charles Van Doren, right, in a contestant’s booth during his series of appearances in 1956 and 1957 on the quiz show “Twenty-One.” The host, center, was Jack Barry. The other contestant was Anthony Whittier. Mr. Van Doren later confessed to Congress that he had been fed the answers to questions.CreditCreditNBC Television, via Getty Images

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/10/obituaries/charles-van-doren-dead.html

Charles Van Doren, a Columbia University English instructor and a member of a distinguished literary family who confessed to Congress and a disillusioned nation in 1959 that his performances on a television quiz show had been rigged, died on Tuesday in Canaan, Conn. He was 93.

He died at Geer Village, a retirement community, near his home in Cornwall, Conn., where he had lived for several years, his son, John, said.

In the heyday of quiz shows in the 1950s, when scholarly housewives and walking encyclopedia nerds battled on “The $64,000 Question” and “Tic-Tac-Dough,” Mr. Van Doren was a rare specimen: a handsome, personable young intellectual with solid academic credentials, a faculty post at a prestigious university and an impressive family pedigree.

<snip>

For 14 weeks, from Nov. 28, 1956, to March 11, 1957, Mr. Van Doren captivated audiences of up to 50 million people with performances on the NBC quiz show “Twenty-One,” answering questions, like: “The Black Sea is connected to the Aegean Sea via two straits and a smaller sea. Name (1) the two straits, (2) the smaller sea, and (3) the four countries that border the Black Sea.”

<snip>

In succeeding months, as rumors and skepticism over TV quiz shows grew, some contestants admitted that the programs had been fixed. The networks denied it, and Mr. Van Doren insisted that he had not taken part in any deceptions. Besides misleading the press and public, he continued to deceive his family and friends, and even lied to a Manhattan grand jury about his performances.

But on Nov. 2, 1959, he told congressional investigators that the shows had all been hoaxes, that he had been given questions and answers in advance, and that he had been coached to make the performances more dramatic.



</snip>