Hello, hello and welcome to another ride on the Wright Challenge go ‘round. For those of you who are just joining us, the Wright Challenge is a semester long contest, created by the mysterious Doctor E., that is open to any UNI student or Iowa high-school student. The student or team who finishes with the most points gets the $60 grand prize, with prizes of $40 or $20 going to the runners up. Kadon Enterprises, makers of fine gamepuzzles since 1980, will supply additional prizes- make sure to check out their website!  Handsome certificates, suitable for framing, will go to all with sufficiently high scores.

Turning in the correct solution to this week’s puzzle by October 8 will earn 2 puzzle points. Three points goes to anyone who turns in the correct solution along with the name of a famous novel in which a young man is forced to get into a fight with strangers immediately before giving a speech to a group of local businessmen.

The number of ways to arrange n different things in a line is called n factorial.

It is written this way: n!
It can be computed this way: n!=(n)(n-1)(n-2)...(3)(2)(1)

For example:  5! = (5)(4)(3)(2)(1) = 120 and 7! = (7)(6)(5)(4)(3)(2)(1) = 5040

Notice that both 5! and 7! have one zero at the end. 10! = 3628800 has two zeros at the end. How many zeros are at the end of 50! ?

The deadline for sending in solutions has expired.  But feel free to take some time to work on this one, and click here to see the answer.   Alternatively, click here to see the current challenge.

Web Page design: Doug Shaw