Brooke Martin, the 12-year-old Galway girl who appeared on the television game show “Jeopardy” this week, came in third, but doesn’t feel too bad about it.
“I’m so proud of her, she is not bothered at all,” said Kelly Martin, Brooke’s mother.
Brooke, who will enter seventh grade this fall in the Galway Central School District, quickly congratulated the two other contestants, second-place finisher Neil Patel of Plano, Texas, and Emma Couture, a 12-year-old from Florida who won the contest.
Kelly Martin said Brooke and Emma became good friends during the taping of the Jeopardy “Kids Week” segment in March. The show was shown locally Thursday night on WTEN Channel 10.
“I really have no hard feelings toward Emma and Neil,” Brooke said about her fellow contestants.
“It was really enjoyable,” she said Friday about the whole experience.
At one point, Brooke was $2,000 ahead of the other two contestants, but then, her mother said, she bet too much on a difficult question about the end of World War II and lost ground quickly.
She still received a check for $1,000. Also, she and her mother, who is a high-school teacher in the Gloversville City School District, received an all-expenses-paid trip to Culver City, Calif., for the taping of the long-running show.
“She had so much fun on this trip,” Kelly Martin said. “She’s a very happy-go-lucky kid; she rolls with things.”
Brooke was one of 15 young people from across the country chosen from a pool of 10,000 applicants to be on the Kids Week edition of the popular game show. She auditioned in Boston in 2009 and again in New York City in 2010. She was notified in February that she would be a contestant.
Brooke’s father, Len, is also a high-school teacher in Gloversville. Her older sister, Karenna, was valedictorian of the Galway High School Class of 2011.
The Martin family held a viewing party for Brooke on Thursday to watch the show.
Kelly Martin said her daughter loves to read and read all the Harry Potter books during the summer between second and third grade.
“The people on the show were so good with the kids, very friendly and positive,” Kelly Martin said.
Brooke and her mother also enjoyed seeing how the show is put together.
“It was cool to see the production part of it,” Kelly Martin said.
This week, a DVD of Brooke’s show, photos of her group of contestants and a photo of Brooke with host Alex Trebek arrived at the Martin home.
Categories: Uncategorized
