1940s Sports
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50 free 1940s Sports trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The 1940s split sport in two. For the first half of the decade, stars swapped uniforms for military ones, Olympic Games were called off, and leagues patched together rosters from whoever was left. Then peace returned, crowds flooded back, and the games that came out the other side looked a lot more like the ones we watch now. This quiz covers the whole decade: record-setting summers in baseball and the players who finally integrated it, heavyweight boxing, college and pro football, the first seasons of big-league basketball, hockey, golf, tennis, horse racing, and the Olympics that restarted after the war. It is written for sports fans, history buffs and quiz hosts who want questions with a story behind them. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you will leave knowing more than the final score.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which Brooklyn Dodgers rookie broke Major League Baseball's color line when he started at first base in April 1947?
Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson won the first Rookie of the Year award that season, and in 1997 his number 42 was retired by every team in the majors.
Q 02Which center fielder set a major league record in 1941 by getting a hit in 56 consecutive games?
Joe DiMaggio
Joe DiMaggio's streak was finally snapped on July 17, thanks in part to two backhand stops by Indians third baseman Ken Keltner.
Q 03Which Cubs owner founded a professional baseball league for women in 1943, while many male players were at war?
Philip Wrigley
Philip Wrigley, the chewing gum mogul, started the league to keep interest in baseball alive during the war, and it later inspired the 1992 film A League of Their Own.
Q 04Which animal did tavern owner William Sianis bring to the 1945 World Series, inspiring a famous Cubs curse?
A goat
A goat named Murphy was the pet Sianis took to the ballpark, and after the pair were asked to leave he is said to have declared that the team would not win again.
Q 05Which heavyweight champion made a record 25 straight title defenses and held the crown from 1937 until retiring in 1949?
Joe Louis
Joe Louis defended his title so often, and won so convincingly, that his challengers were given the collective nickname the Bum of the Month Club.
Q 06Which city was first chosen to host the 1940 Summer Olympics, which later moved to Helsinki before being cancelled?
Tokyo
Tokyo lost the Games after war with China broke out in 1937, and the city had to wait until 1964 to stage a Summer Olympics.
Q 07Which city staged the 1948 Summer Olympics, nicknamed the Austerity Games because wartime rationing was still in force?
London
London built no new venues for the Games, and athletes were housed in existing accommodation instead of an Olympic Village.
Q 08Which golfer survived a head-on collision with a Greyhound bus in 1949 and won the US Open just 16 months later?
Ben Hogan
Ben Hogan's doctors were skeptical that he would ever walk independently again, so his 1950 comeback victory became known as the Miracle at Merion.
Q 09In which US state did rink owner Frank Zamboni invent the first ice-resurfacing machine in 1949?
California
California was home to the Iceland rink that Zamboni built in Paramount, where smoothing the ice had taken three or four workers with scrapers and squeegees.
Q 10Which racing body did Bill France found in 1948 after a series of meetings at the Streamline Hotel in Daytona Beach?
NASCAR
NASCAR was formed on February 21, 1948, after talks that France began with other racers and promoters in the hotel's Ebony Bar the previous December.
Q 11Which Boston Red Sox outfielder batted .406 in 1941 after refusing to sit out the final day to protect his average?
Ted Williams
Ted Williams was hitting .39955, which would have rounded up to .400, but he played both games of a doubleheader and went 6-for-8.
Q 12Which Negro leagues legend made his major league debut for Cleveland in 1948 at the age of 42?
Satchel Paige
Satchel Paige was the oldest man ever to debut in the American or National League, and that fall he became the first Negro leagues veteran to pitch in a World Series.
Q 13Which outfielder became the American League's first Black player when Bill Veeck signed him for Cleveland in July 1947?
Larry Doby
Q 21Which college team starred Doc Blanchard and Glenn Davis, the Heisman winners called Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside?
Army
Army compiled an undefeated 27–0–1 record in the three seasons the pair played together, the lone blemish a famous 0–0 tie with Notre Dame in 1946.
Q 22Which university hosted the 1942 Rose Bowl in its own stadium after Pearl Harbor made a West Coast game too risky?
Duke
Duke invited the game to Durham, North Carolina, then lost it 20–16 to Oregon State; no other Rose Bowl left Pasadena until 2021.
Q 23Which Washington quarterback led the NFL in passing, punting and interceptions all in 1943?
Sammy Baugh
Sammy Baugh doubled as a safety, and that year he became the first player in league history to intercept four passes in a single game.
Larry Doby was batting .415 for his Negro leagues club in Newark when Veeck bought his contract for a total of $15,000.
Q 14Which Cleveland Indians ace volunteered for the US Navy two days after Pearl Harbor and served aboard the USS Alabama?
Bob Feller
Bob Feller lost nearly four seasons to the war and served as a gun captain, keeping his pitching arm in shape by throwing near a gun turret.
Q 15Which Tigers slugger came back from 47 months of military service to hit a pennant-clinching grand slam in 1945?
Hank Greenberg
Hank Greenberg served longer than any other major league player, then hit his ninth-inning homer on the final day of the season.
Q 16Which Cardinals star, nicknamed "The Man", won his third National League MVP award in 1948?
Stan Musial
Stan Musial picked up his nickname during the 1946 season, and in 1948 he finished just one home run short of baseball's Triple Crown.
Q 17Which outfielder reached the major leagues in 1945 despite having lost his right arm in a childhood accident?
Pete Gray
Pete Gray caught the ball, slipped off his glove and threw with the same hand in one motion, and he had been his minor league's Most Valuable Player in 1944.
Q 18In which state has the Little League World Series been played since the first tournament was held in 1947?
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania's tournament began as a mostly American affair, and a team from Monterrey, Mexico, became the first champion from outside the United States in 1957.
Q 19Which team beat Washington 73–0 in the 1940 NFL Championship Game, the most one-sided result in league history?
Chicago Bears
Chicago Bears players kicked so many footballs into the stands after touchdowns that officials asked the team to run or pass for its last two extra points.
Q 20Wartime player shortages forced the Pittsburgh Steelers to merge for the 1943 NFL season with which other team?
Philadelphia Eagles
Philadelphia Eagles and Steelers players formed a combined team nicknamed the Steagles, many of them men the military had judged unfit to serve.
Q 24Which quarterback led the Cleveland Browns to the title in all four seasons of the All-America Football Conference?
Otto Graham
Otto Graham also won a professional basketball championship in 1946, which made him a champion in two major sports in the same year.
Q 25In which city were the Lakers based when they won the 1949 BAA championship, long before the move to Los Angeles?
Minneapolis
Minneapolis gave the team its name, which was chosen in 1947 because of Minnesota's thousands of lakes.
Q 26Which bespectacled DePaul center was so dominant in the late 1940s that pro basketball later widened the foul lane?
George Mikan
George Mikan also prompted the goaltending rule and the shot clock, and the wider lane became known simply as the Mikan Rule.
Q 27Which city's Huskies hosted the first game of the league that became the NBA, losing to New York in November 1946?
Toronto
Toronto drew an opening night crowd of 7,090 for the 68–66 defeat, but the Huskies disbanded after that single season.
Q 28Which touring team made headlines in 1948 by beating the Lakers, one of America's best white basketball teams?
Harlem Globetrotters
Harlem Globetrotters players won 61–59 with a basket at the buzzer, a result that challenged racial stereotypes about the abilities of Black athletes.
Q 29Which university's "Fabulous Five", led by Ralph Beard and Alex Groza, won the 1948 NCAA basketball tournament?
Kentucky
Kentucky's five starters then played as a unit at that summer's Olympics and came home with gold medals.
Q 30Which middleweight, later played by Robert De Niro in Raging Bull, took the world title from Marcel Cerdan in 1949?
Jake LaMotta
Jake LaMotta was nicknamed the Bronx Bull for his constant stalking and brawling, and he won when the champion could not answer the bell for the tenth round.