10 Things You Didn’t Know About Jeopardy! Champion Ken Jennings

Game show quizzer Ken Jennings went from being a contestant on “Jeopardy!” to hosting the longtime quiz show, but here are 10 things you probably don’t know about the 50-year-old trivia master.

1. Ken was born in Seattle, Wash., but grew up in South Korea and Singapore as his family spent 15 years in the area while his father worked as an international attorney. His only American pop culture access was TV on the Armed Forces Network — and he watched “Jeopardy!” every day after school.

2. Jennings moved to the U.S. to attend the University of Washington before transferring to Brigham Young University after a two-year Mormon mission to Spain. At BYU, Ken majored in computer science, and graduated in 2000 with fiancée Mindy. They married that fall.

3. Ken began training for his “Jeopardy!” success at BYU, where he captained the school’s quiz bowl team, then began writing questions for National Academic Quiz Tournaments, the company that organizes quizzes for colleges and high schools around the country.

4. When he noticed friends appearing on TV quiz shows and winning enough money to pay off college debts and buy pricey items, Ken applied to be on “Jeopardy!”

5. Jennings was working as a software engineer for a Salt Lake City health care staffing company when he got the invitation to be on the popular game show in 2004, which was hosted by Alex Trebek. He had a month to cram for his appearance.

6. When the show’s rules changed to allow champions to return indefinitely, Ken reeled off a record 74 straight games while winning $2.52 million — both records at the time. His streak held “Jeopardy!” fans mesmerized for six months.

7. He finally lost to Nancy Zerg on the Final Jeopardy! Question: “Most of this firm’s 70,000 seasonal white-collar employees work only four months a year.” Ken wrote down FedEx while Nancy correctly answered H&R Block. H&R Block offered Ken free tax preparations for life.

8. Ken defeated Brad Rutter and James Holzhauer in 2020 in a “Jeopardy!” competition and is named the show’s “Greatest of All Time.”

9. Jennings cohosts the “strange but true stories” podcast Omnibus with musician John Roderick.

10. Ken and Mindy have a daughter, Caitlin Elizabeth, born in 2006, and a son, Dylan, born in 2002.