ALTON - One of Alton native Madeline Hornsey’s "biggest lifetime thrills" will be aired on the game show Jeopardy at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday on KSDK, when she makes an appearance.
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Madeline says meeting legendary Jeopardy host Ken Jennings was also a huge thrill. She described Ken as "one of my heroes" and “probably the smartest person I have ever met."
The show was taped in October in Los Angeles. Madeline said when she walked onto the Jeopardy game stage it was “a huge deal for me.”
“It is my favorite show,” she said. “one of my fondest memories was being at Saint Anthony’s waiting room in Alton and watching the classical music category. I blurted out all the answers! I thought then I might want to do this someday, I think I would be good at it.”
Rick Hornsey said he and his wife, Cindy, were exceptionally proud of their daughter Madeline.
“It was a great opportunity for her and she seemed to like it,” he said. “She is a very smart child. We are so proud of her. Mrs. Laura Plummer (the AHS Orchestra Director) is proud of her too, as is the Alton School District and ABOB.”
Madeline is an Alton High School graduate. She is an outstanding violin/viola player. She has been selected as the principal violist for the Texas Symphony in Dallas, which also makes Plummer and the others proud.
Madeline will be nervous when 4:30 p.m. Central time comes and she is on the St. Louis area KSDK Jeopardy broadcast. She said she knows she will have a fan collection back home.
She said she has a hard time remembering the questions she answered correctly on Jeopardy, but can fully remember the ones she missed.
“I didn’t think anybody back home would notice and I was very surprised the school district shared it when they learned about it,” she said. “This is a fun little thing and a story I will always be able to tell. I am excited to see the reaction of everybody back home.”
Madeline has a master’s and a bachelor’s degree from the University of Illinois. Her master’s degree is in Library Science and her bachelor’s in Classics.
“I love trivia overall,” she said. “It is something I definitely will continue in my life. I was part of Scholar Bowl in high school, so I received my start there.”
Madeline encountered multiple auditions and two final ones on Zoom, one where she had to play the game, before her ultimate selection.
The AHS grad is a seventh-grade math and science teacher in the Plano School District in Texas. Last year she taught in the Dallas School District.
“I love teaching,” she said. “It is similar to trivia, you share a lot of knowledge with the children and work on and learn new things every day. I do really enjoy it.”
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