There’s No Place Like Our ‘Wizard of Oz’ Quiz

Before The Wizard of Oz was a movie, it was a critically acclaimed children’s book — The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, published in 1900. Neither is one of a kind. The book was the first in a series of 14 about the fictional Land of Oz. The movie, meanwhile, is one of at least 20 film adaptations to date. The oldest surviving version is a silent film that debuted in 1910 and combined aspects of Baum’s original story with elements of a theatrical production staged in 1902.

The Wizard of Oz begins with a tornado that knocks Dorothy unconscious, commencing her dream-induced journey to Oz. The realistic tornado sequence ran wildly over budget. Special effects coordinator Arnold Gillespie created the twister using muslin cloth mended with wire and hung from a steel gantry. He then used giant fans along with compressed air and a brown powder called Fullers Earth to create the effect of a tornado tearing through the Kansas prairie.

Although it’s hard to imagine The Wizard of Oz without it, the timeless tune that became Judy Garland’s signature number almost ended up on the cutting room floor. According to Oz lore, studio executives thought “Over the Rainbow” made the 2-hour movie too long. So, they suggested cutting it. When associate producer Arthur Freed took a stand, however — he threatened to quit if the song was chopped — executives relented and allowed it to stay.

A female cairn terrier named Terry was paid $125 per week to star alongside Judy Garland as Dorothy’s beloved dog, Toto. Reportedly, Terry earned more than double what some of the film’s human actors were paid — namely, the Munchkins, who earned just $50 per week. Although Terry appeared in numerous feature films, The Wizard of Oz is one of only two movies for which she received a screen credit.

As far as we know, the heroine from The Wizard of Oz is entirely fictional. There are a few unproven theories about her name, though. According to one, Oz creator L. Frank Baum was inspired by a real-life tornado outbreak that killed a girl named Dorothy Gale in Irving, Kansas, in 1879. While the tornados were real, there’s no evidence they were Baum’s inspiration. A more likely but still unsubstantiated theory is that Baum named Dorothy after his niece, Dorothy Gage, who died as an infant.