Count, but spell out the values: ONE, TWO, THREE,
...
When do you first encounter the letter "C"?
In other words, what is the first number that
contains the letter "C"?
Be careful to give the complete name of the number
(like one hundred -- not just
hundred!).
Note: the number 123 is one hundred
twenty-three, NOT one hundred and
twenty-three."
(Perhaps a more challenging problem would have been
to give the sequence of all the letters as they
appear in the counting numbers, and to find which
letters are never used! For example, O, N, E, T,
W, H, R, ...).
Solution:
The answer is: 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 = ONE OCTILLION.
It is interesting to note the order in which the
alphabet letters appear:
O N E T W H R F U I V S X G L Y D A M B Q P C.
No number has J, K, or Z in it!! No ZILLION!!!!
Correctly solved by:
| 1. Tom Marino | Winchester, VA |
| 2. Bob Hearn | Winchester, VA |
| 3. Elizabeth Cotter | Centreville, VA |
| 4. Jon Pence | Winchester, VA |
| 5. Jeremy Ramsey | Williamsburg, VA (College of William and Mary) |
| 6. Richard Mocarski | Winchester, VA |