Oakland’s Amy Schneider’s ‘Jeopardy!’ Run Ends, with 40 Win Streak
Oakland, CA resident Amy Schneider’s 40-game win streak on Jeopardy! has come to an end.
Schneider holds the second-longest consecutive win streak in show history, she took over the No. 2 spot previously held by Matt Amodio earlier this week. She had hoped to continue her historic run on Wednesday, but lost in Final Jeopardy to a librarian from Chicago.
Heading into Final Jeopardy, Schneider was leading Chicago librarian Rhone Talsma, her score was $27,600, while Talsma had $17,600.
It all came down to the final clue. The category was “Countries of the World” and the clue was: “The only nation in the world whose name in English ends in an H, it’s also one of the 10 most populous.”
Schneider didn’t come up with an answer. But Talsma responded correctly: “What is Bangladesh?” That allowed him to finish in first place with a score of $29,600 to Schneider’s $19,600.
“I had thought that Rhone was going to be tough going into it,” Schneider said. “… I could tell that he was here to play and that he was going to be good. I still came very close to winning, but I did feel like maybe I was slipping a little bit.”
Amy still walked away with over $1.3 Million in prize money and the second-longest winning streak in Jeopordy history. Here she is talking about her streak and history this week, in the lead up to 40 wins.
Schneider will return for the Tournament of Champions in the fall. She’s the first openly trans contestant to qualify.
“It’s really been an honor,” Amy said. “To know that I’m one of the most successful people at a game I’ve loved since I was a kid and to know that I’m a part of its history now, I just don’t know how to process it.”
Amy is originally from Dayton Ohio, but has been working as an Engineering Manager in Oakland and has lived in the Bay Area since 2009. Schneider’s first Jeopardy victory occurred on the November 17, 2021 episode.
What a legend!
Amy published some words on Jeopordy.com this morning in a piece called: AMY SCHNEIDER: WHAT I LEARNED FROM MY JEOPARDY! EXPERIENCEÂ (read the whole post here.)Â bellow are her closing words:
“And while, as I’ve said, my trans identity is only one part of myself, it has also been the source of easily the biggest rewards I’ve gotten from this experience. The first one is personal: a few months ago, deep down, I simply did not believe that I could ever really be accepted for who I was. That is, I had come to believe (not without some difficulty) that at least some people accepted me: my family, my girlfriend, my inner circle of friends. But I always believed that most people would see me as trans people have so often been seen: a freak, a pervert, a man in a dress, a liar, mentally ill. And as the days counted down to my episodes airing, I braced myself for the rejection I was sure would come. And then… it just didn’t. Sure, there have been a few isolated voices trying to bring me down, but the overwhelming reaction has been of support and acceptance. People actually believe me when I say who I am. They don’t think there’s something wrong with me. And because of that, for maybe the first time in my life, I’m starting to think there really isn’t anything wrong with me either.
But the acceptance I’ve received isn’t due to any special qualities in myself (or at least, those qualities aren’t the most important reason for it). The acceptance I’ve received is the fruit of long, violent struggles – some famous, some forgotten – in which generations of trans people have risked their lives to secure their basic right to exist. Frances Thompson and Billy Tipton, Lili Elbe and Dora Richter, Sylvia Rivera and Felicia Elizondo, Laverne Cox and Gavin Grimm, and so many more who are lost to history, have devoted themselves to creating the conditions that exist today, where a trans Jeopardy! champion can be, for most people, uncritically accepted and celebrated as the person she is. And the most rewarding thing I’ve gained from my Jeopardy! run is the ability to finally say that I, too, have helped that cause. I haven’t thrown rocks at the police, or fought for my rights in the Supreme Court; all I’ve really done is chase a lifelong dream of appearing on Jeopardy!. But I knew that I was taking on a burden of representation, and I will always and forever be proud to say that I’ve done my little part to ease the path for future generations of trans people to live free, open, and happy lives, and that feeling is worth more to me than any financial gain could ever be.
But I’ll be keeping the million dollars. As I told Ken one time, I like money!”
