Ex Gazette photo editor dies @59 ,What was his Name ?

This topic heading could very well be a future question on the Trivial Pursuit Board Game............Chris Haney ,who co-invented the very popular board game,& made himself millions has died at the age of 59. That's young,at least he got to enjoy his wealth for a bunch of years.but still checked out rather early:

Chris Haney, the Canadian co-creator of the hit board game Trivial Pursuit, died yesterday in a Toronto hospital. He was 59.

Former colleagues of Haney, who was a photo editor at the Montreal Gazette when he invented the quiz game with fellow journalist Scott Abbott, were saddened to learn of his death.

Haney and Abbott came up with the concept for the immensely popular game in December 1979, when they were toiling over a game of Scrabble. They wanted to create something as wide-reaching as the classic word game, and within an hour Haney and Abbott had a rough framework for Trivial Pursuit - including categories and the circular board - scrawled out on paper placemats.

Since then, millions of copies have been sold around the world.

Gazette photographer John Mahoney, who worked under Haney when he started at the newspaper, said he was a brilliant, self-taught mind with a desire to live life to the fullest.

"He had a cutting wit, which kept some people at bay, but when you got to know him, he was a guy that was very loyal," Mahoney said.

"He was a guy who never wanted to work 9 to 5. He believed the best education was travel and invented Trivial Pursuit with the hope it would bring in enough money every year that he could live on the beach in Spain and travel through Europe."

It certainly did.

Mahoney said Haney had a fear of flying and would travel by cruise ship to Spain each winter, where he counted actor Sean Connery among his neighbours. Haney would then return to Canada by ship in the spring, Mahoney said. When he wasn't overseas, Haney lived near Caledon, northwest of Toronto.

Before his success with the board game, Haney also excelled at his full-time job, said Mahoney, who last spoke with Haney about two years ago. Haney said success didn't change him much, and said he still rolled his own cigarettes, Mahoney added.

Themed versions of Haney's immensely popular quiz game have also surfaced over the years, much to the delight of fans of everything from Star Wars to Saturday Night Live.

Each edition of the game has thousands of questions in a variety of categories, which have entertained families, friends and patrons at trivia nights and pubs for years.

The game reached an incredible height of success in the mid-1980s, when more than 20 million copies of the game were sold in North America.

Trivial Pursuit was recently the centre of a legal battle after a Cape Breton, N.S., man insisted the game's concept was his idea. After hearing from more than 50 witnesses, not one of whom supported the man's claim, the case was dismissed in 2007.

Haney is survived by his wife and three children.

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

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