
Originally Posted by
killykilly
Hi ! I'm trying to brush up on my algebra for an exam next week. I stumbled on this one.
"A rich man called his seven sons. He had with him a number of pebbles, each pebble representing a gold bar. To his first son, he gave half of the pebbles that he initially had and one pebble more. To his second son, he gave half of the remaining pebbles and one pebble more. He did the same to each of his five other sons and then found out that he had one pebble left. How many pebbles were there initially ?"
Book says the correct answer is 382. I tried solving it using geometric progression but I keep getting with a decimal, which of course is incorrect. Could someone please give me a hint on how to solve this one ? Many thanks !