Brain Teasers
Actress Alphametic
For one of the two actress names below, it is possible to replace each letter with
a unique digit 0–9 to produce a valid addition statement. Can you determine
which name works and which one doesn’t?
SUSAN MARY
+
SAINT + BETH
JAMES HURT
This brainteaser was
written by Derrick Niederman.
Solution:
Susan Saint James works, Mary Beth Hurt does not.
To see why Mary Beth Hurt’s name does not work, give the
puzzle another look.
In the tens column, there is an R in the first addend, and
there is an R in the sum. For that to work, T must be either 0 or 9, depending
on whether there was any carrying from the ones column. But in the ones column,
notice that there is a T in the sum. This leads to a problem. If T = 0,
there were will be carrying from the ones column, and if T = 9, there will be
no carrying — exactly opposite of what is needed! Hence, no solution is
possible.
MARY
+ BETH
HURT
Susan Saint James’s name works out a whole lot better. Below
is one of several possible solutions:
40461
+ 46513
86974
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