American Trivia
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150 free American trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
This is the American trivia everyone is supposed to know, and a few things most people don't. The 150 free questions with answers cover the flag and its stars, the bald eagle, the Great Seal, the national anthem, the White House and Capitol, Independence Day and Thanksgiving, the money in your wallet, and the landmarks on every road trip: Route 66, Mount Rushmore, the Grand Canyon, the Hollywood Sign and the Statue of Liberty. Most questions are genuinely basic and suit kids, new citizens practising for the civics test, or a warm-up round at a Fourth of July party. A handful dig deeper: which president officially named the White House, who painted the 'I Want You' poster, and when 'under God' entered the Pledge. Every answer is verified against Wikipedia's articles on the United States, its symbols and its landmarks, and each question carries its source.
30 of 150 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The 13 stripes on the flag of the United States stand for what?
The thirteen original colonies
The thirteen original colonies gave the flag its stripes; a 1794 law raised the count to 15 after two more states joined, but Congress went back to 13 in 1818 and added only stars from then on.
Q 02The Statue of Liberty was a gift to the United States from the people of which country?
France
France's people paid for the statue itself, but Americans had to fund the pedestal; Joseph Pulitzer's newspaper appeal drew more than 100,000 donors, most of them giving a dollar or less.
Q 03Which ruler sold Louisiana to America in 1803?
Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon Bonaparte offered the whole territory for $15 million when American envoys had been sent to buy little more than the port of New Orleans, a deal that roughly doubled the country's size.
Q 04Who was the first president to live in the White House?
John Adams
John Adams moved into the still unfinished White House on 1 November 1800; George Washington had chosen the site but left office before it was ready and never lived there.
Q 05Francis Scott Key wrote the national anthem in 1814 after the British bombarded which Baltimore fort?
Fort McHenry
Fort McHenry held out through some 25 hours of shelling on 13-14 September 1814; Key watched from a truce ship, kept offshore by the enemy fleet after he helped negotiate a prisoner's release.
Q 06Which was the first national park in the United States, created in 1872?
Yellowstone
Yellowstone was signed into being by Ulysses S. Grant in 1872, but it got almost no money or staff, and poachers went largely unchecked until the US Army took over in 1886.
Q 07The Golden Gate Bridge spans a one-mile strait between the Pacific Ocean and which bay?
San Francisco Bay
San Francisco Bay's bridge opened in 1937 with a record 4,200-foot main span; a safety net slung beneath the deck during construction caught 19 falling workers, who called themselves the Half Way to Hell Club.
Q 08Which amendment to the US Constitution, adopted in 1920, bars denying the vote on account of sex?
The Nineteenth
The Nineteenth Amendment cleared its last hurdle in Tennessee by a single vote: young legislator Harry Burn cast the deciding yes after a letter from his mother urged him to back it.
Q 09Mount Rushmore carries the faces of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and which fourth president?
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt was the sculptor's pick to represent the nation's development: he had pushed through the Panama Canal and taken on the big business trusts.
Q 10The first transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869 at Promontory Summit, in which territory?
Utah
Utah Territory's Promontory Summit hosted the last-spike ceremony on 10 May 1869; an iron spike and hammer were wired to the telegraph so the country could hear the blows, and Leland Stanford's swing missed.
Q 11When it first went up in 1923, the Hollywood Sign spelled out which word?
HOLLYWOODLAND
HOLLYWOODLAND was put up in 1923 as a temporary advertisement for a hillside housing development; the sign outlived the sales drive, and its last four letters were taken down in 1949.
Q 12Who proposed the Twenty-seventh Amendment alongside the Bill of Rights?
James Madison
James Madison's amendment on congressional pay was largely forgotten until 1982, when student Gregory Watson, given a C for a paper arguing it could still pass, began the letter campaign that got it ratified in 1992.
Q 13In which city can visitors see the Liberty Bell?
Philadelphia
Q 21What is the street address of the White House?
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW has not always been habitable: the mansion was burned in 1814, during the War of 1812, and presidents lived elsewhere for three years while it was rebuilt.
Q 22Which president had the first telephone installed in the White House, in 1877?
Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford B. Hayes had the first telephone installed in the White House in 1877, the year after Alexander Graham Bell patented the device.
Q 23What is the title of the US national anthem?
The Star-Spangled Banner
Philadelphia's State House bell had no special name until abolitionists adopted it as a symbol in the 1830s and began calling it the Liberty Bell.
Q 14The trophy handed to the Super Bowl champions is named after which coach?
Vince Lombardi
Vince Lombardi coached the Green Bay Packers to victory in the first two Super Bowls; the trophy was renamed in his memory after he died in September 1970.
Q 15The United States bought Alaska in 1867 from which country?
Russia
Russia sold Alaska for $7.2 million under a treaty signed on 30 March 1867; Tsar Alexander II had sought a buyer after the Crimean War showed the territory could not be defended.
Q 16How many states make up the United States?
50
The last two, Alaska and Hawaii, both joined in 1959; the 48 'contiguous' states are the ones on the mainland between Canada and Mexico.
Q 17Which state, along with Maryland, gave up land to create the federal District of Columbia?
Virginia
Virginia's share, including the town of Alexandria, was handed back in the 1840s, which is why the district today lies entirely on the Maryland side of the Potomac.
Q 18Which flower was named the national floral emblem of the United States in 1986?
Rose
The rose became the national floral emblem when Ronald Reagan signed a joint resolution of Congress and proclaimed it on 20 November 1986, in a White House Rose Garden ceremony.
Q 19Which bird is the national bird of the United States?
Bald eagle
The bald eagle has appeared on the Great Seal since 1782, but it was only an unofficial national bird until Congress passed a law making the title official in December 2024.
Q 20On which date in 1776 did Congress vote for independence?
July 2
July 2 was the day one future president wrote home that Americans would celebrate for ever; the holiday instead follows July 4, the date printed on the Declaration.
The Star-Spangled Banner sets Francis Scott Key's 1814 poem to the tune of 'To Anacreon in Heaven', a song written for a London gentlemen's music club.
Q 24Which president signed the 1931 act making America's national anthem official?
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover signed the act in March 1931, some 117 years after the song was written; until then it had been official only for military use.
Q 25What does the motto on the scroll in the Great Seal eagle's beak mean?
Out of many, one
Out of many, one translates E pluribus unum, which served as the nation's unofficial motto until Congress adopted a different one in 1956.
Q 26The Great Seal's eagle clutches arrows and what else?
An olive branch
An olive branch fills the eagle's other talon; the seal's designer explained that the branch and the arrows together stand for the power of peace and war.
Q 27On which day of November is Thanksgiving celebrated?
The fourth Thursday
The fourth Thursday was fixed by Congress in 1941, after Franklin D. Roosevelt moved the holiday a week earlier in 1939 to lengthen the Christmas shopping season and many states refused to go along.
Q 28The Pilgrims shared their famous 1621 harvest feast at Plymouth with men of which Native nation?
Wampanoag
Wampanoag men, about 90 led by Massasoit, outnumbered the 50 or so colonists and added venison to a feast that lasted three days.
Q 29Which national symbol is traditionally traced to a Troy meat-packer who supplied army beef in the War of 1812?
Uncle Sam
Uncle Sam is said to come from the 'U.S.' stamped on Samuel Wilson's beef barrels, which soldiers linked to 'Uncle Sam' Wilson; the origin is disputed, but Congress endorsed the story in 1961.
Q 30Which phrase was added to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954?
Under God
Under God was added in 1954, during the Cold War, after a campaign by religious groups; the original 1892 pledge, written by Baptist minister Francis Bellamy, had no religious reference.