Frank holds the record for most money won in 5 consecutive appearances, $102,597. Frank's record, set back in 1990, hasn't been eclipsed, even since the Jeopardy! dollar values doubled this season. Now a lieutenant in the NYPD, he noted to Alex during the 10th Anniversary Tournament that his success on the show "made a career in undercover policing very unlikely." His winning response of that tournament "Who is Wendy Wasserstein?" earned him an invitation to dinner with the Pulitzer Prize winning author who said she "wanted to meet the man that remembered her name." Frank can be seen every year marching in the St. Patrick's Day Parade up Fifth Avenue.
Hi, I'm Frank Spangenberg, Jeopardy! champion. Right now you're watching me on jeopardy.com.
When did you first appear on Jeopardy!?
I first appeared on Jeopardy! in January of 1990.
How much money did you win in your previous competitions?
I still have the record for the most won in five games. Even with the money doubled. Kinda nice. $102,597 in five games.
How have you spent your winnings?
Spent every penny. I bought a house. Most of it went for a down payment on a house. However, uh, at the time, the cutoff was $75,000. So, everything over $75,000 went to a charity that you choose before the game starts, and so my charity ended up getting $27,000, which was real nice. It went to an AIDS hospice here in New York City, Gift of Love of the Missionaries of Charity, which are Mother Teresa's nuns.
What is your fondest memory from your previous appearances on Jeopardy!?
My favorite memory of my first appearance was the end of the fifth game, when it was finally all over.
How has being on Jeopardy! changed your life?
It made me, uh--being on Jeopardy! made me much less anonymous than I had been. I'm amazed at how many people watch Jeopardy! and recognize you on the street. Even today, which is more than ten years later, people still remember me from then.
Since being on Jeopardy! what kind of questions do you get asked?
I was receiving all sorts of strange letters, but yes, I even got a couple of proposals of marriage from women I had never met, and also one from a mother of a woman whom I had never met--I had never met the mother either--but she said I would be ideal for her daughter. |
"He still holds the record for the most money won in five consecutive games. Now a lieutenant in the New York Police Department, from Douglaston, New York..."
2014 Battle of the Decades invitee: $5,000.
2005 Ultimate Tournament of Champions Nifty Nine (players with byes into Round 2), Elite Eighteen (Round 2 winners) and Sweet Six (Round 3 winners) member: $105,199.
2002 Million Dollar Masters tournament quarterfinalist: $10,000.
1993 10th Anniversary Tournament champion: $41,800.
1990 Tournament of Champions semifinalist: $5,000.
1990 Super Jeopardy! quarterfinalist: $5,000.
Season 6 5-time champion: $102,597 (winnings capped at $75,000 per the rules of the show at the time; $27,597 donated to Frank's selected charity, the Missionaries of Charity in New York City, an order of nuns that runs a hospice in Manhattan, a branch of the Calcutta mission administered at the time by Mother Teresa).
Frank held the record for cash winnings in regular games ($102,597) between January 1990 and April 2003, when overtaken by Brian Weikle with the advantage of doubled dollar amounts. As adjusted for doubled dollar values (to $205,194), Frank's record stood for 29 years until broken by James Holzhauer (#7968, aired 2019-04-10), with $298,687.
In his fifth game (#1241, aired 1990-01-15), Frank set a single-day cash winnings record of $30,600, breaking the previous record of $27,800 set by Kevin Frear (#902, aired 1988-07-05) and tied by Bob Blake in his second game (#1149, aired 1989-09-07). Frank's record lasted for over two years, when it was broken by Jerome Vered's $34,000 finish in show #1794, aired 1992-05-21.
Frank appeared on Grand Slam on 2007-08-12. He was defeated and eliminated in the Sweet 16 round by Twenty-One 6-time champion David Legler. |
