Did Patty Duke expose the 64000 Question as being rigged?

Answer 1

No, but it is possible, though unlikely, that Patty Duke may have testified before a congressional committee about the rigging of another quiz show. Ms. Duke had appeared on The $64,000 Challenge, a spin-off of The $64,000 Question that featured winners from the original show and celebrities like Ms. Duke, and had won $32,000.

Many sources report that she did testify, but those reports appear to be based on a hearsay account that Sonny Fox gave to the producers of the 1991 PBS American Experience film The Quiz Show Scandal. Since Fox got the show and Patty's age wrong and talked about a Senate hearing when the investigation was actually conducted by the House, there is good reason to doubt his version, but it is a great story.

The contemporary account in The New York Times says that it was Ms. Duke's manager, John Ross, who testified that she had been given the answers just before appearing on the show. The testimony was given in a closed session of the House Committee on Legislative Oversight on November 3, 1959, more than a year after the scandal first broke.

The testimony came after many others had testified to the committee about the rigging of quiz shows, including Charles Van Doren, the Columbia University Assistant Professor, who had become a huge star with his win on Twenty-One. The first to testify about the rigging of both $64,000 shows had been the Rev. Stoney Jackson, who had been a big winner on both shows. Band leader Xavier Cugat had also testified about the rigging of The $64,000 Challenge.