Purdue archivist wins again, up to $183K on Jeopardy!

Host Ken Jennings said the obvious, in his cheery, sincere manner.

“What a week you’ve had.”

Adriana Harmeyer inhaled through a smile and nodded. Her shoulders dropped. The archivist from West Lafayette was $27,400 richer. The payday was the biggest she’s had in her eight days on the game show Jeopardy!, the result of a $7,800 wager in Final Jeopardy.

Her competition to her left, the fiercest she’s had in her stint on the show, answered “Deng” for a question Harmeyer answered correctly with a neatly scrawled “Mau Zedong,” in reference to the time Richard Nixon quoted a poem by the Chinese dictator.

Harmeyer lost her lead once on Friday, to that same competition on the left, Kevin Stuhlman. Stuhlman was a tall man with dark, short hair and bushy eyebrows that furrowed as he pounded his answering button with his thumb. A pastor from Michigan, Stuhlman challenged Harmeyer in two distinct areas of knowledge: Michigan and the Bible.

In round one, Stuhlman took the lead by finishing off the Michigan category, answering Battle Creek to a question which referenced the Great Lakes State's city as a place known for its “killer cereal.”

Harmeyer put herself on the highway to another win when she answered Double Jeopardy correctly, making up for a miss in her previous chance. She was tasked with determining the movie that opened with this quote:

“Be seated. Now, I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country.”

She paused, collecting, before answering, “What is Patton?”

Jennings told her she was correct; George C. Scott uttered those lines as the domineering general in 1970’s “Patton.”

Harmeyer is now on an eight-day win streak with a total of $183,100 in winnings. After the game ended, Jennings strolled over to chat like they were old friends.

She will take the podium again Monday at 7:30 p.m.