50 free Crayon trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
42 free crayon trivia questions with answers. Almost everyone has held a Crayola crayon, and almost nobody knows who named it, why 'Flesh' became 'Peach' or which colour America voted its favourite in 2000. This crayon trivia covers the whole box: Edwin and Alice Binney, the 1903 launch, the dustless-chalk gold medal that ended up on every box, the Munsell colour wheel, the 1957 64-pack with its sharpener, the retirements of 1990 and 2003, Dandelion's farewell and Bluetiful's arrival, Silly Putty, the Crayola Experience and the 1,500-pound blue crayon. There are questions on crayons before Crayola too: Pliny the Elder and encaustic wax, the French chalk pencil, Jane Austen's 1813 mention, and the Massachusetts stationer who rolled leather-marking wax into sticks. Easy ones any kid can get; hard ones for people who remember what Indian Red was renamed. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries on Crayola, the crayon and its colours, and each question shows the sentence that backs it up. Good for a classroom, a craft party or a rainy-day family quiz.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Crayola crayons were first sold in which year?
1903
Edwin Binney and his wife Alice developed the line after the company's 1902 Staonal marking crayon, which was too toxic for children.
Q 02The name 'Crayola' combines the French word for chalk with a suffix meaning what?
Oily
The founder's wife, a former schoolteacher, coined it; '-ola' was a fashionable suffix, as in granola, pianola and Victrola.
Q 03Who coined the Crayola brand name?
Alice Binney
She was Edwin Binney's wife and a former schoolteacher.
Q 04Which greeting-card company has owned Crayola since 1984?
Hallmark Cards
The company had traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol BYS before the takeover.
Q 05Where is Crayola headquartered?
Forks Township, Pennsylvania
The company reorganised as Crayola LLC in 2007 to reflect its number-one brand.
Q 06Before crayons, Binney & Smith's carbon black was famously used to colour and strengthen what product?
Car tyres
Their red iron oxide pigment also went into barn paint, and their cheap black earned a gold medal at the 1900 Paris Exposition.
Q 07Edwin Binney won a gold medal at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair for inventing what?
Dustless white chalk
He made it by experimenting with slate waste, cement and talc, and the medal ended up on Crayola boxes for 50 years.
Q 08How were Edwin Binney and C. Harold Smith related?
Cousins
Binney was born in Shrub Oak, New York; Smith was born in London.
Q 09The 64-crayon box, called a 'watershed' by a Smithsonian curator, debuted in which year?
1957
It was the first box with a built-in sharpener; four rows of sixteen sit progressively raised inside the flip-top.
Q 10How many crayons were in the box that Crayola introduced in 1949, its largest for a decade?
48
A 52-colour assortment had briefly existed from 1939 until wartime pigment shortages killed it.
Q 11The 'Flesh' crayon was renamed to what in 1962, partly in response to the civil rights movement?
Peach
It had been 'Flesh Tint' until 1949 and 'Pink Beige' from 1956 to 1958.
Q 12In 1999 Crayola renamed 'Indian Red' to what?
Chestnut
The colour, in the line since the company's earliest years, referred to a pigment from India, but the company feared children would read it as a skin tone.
Q 13Which of these was among the eight colours Crayola retired into the 'Crayon Hall of Fame' in 1990?
Maize
Lemon Yellow, Raw Umber, Orange-Red, Orange-Yellow, Green-Blue, Violet-Blue and Blue-Gray went with it; Cerulean and Dandelion were among the replacements.
Q 21How many colours had Crayola officially retired by the end of 2024?
13
Retirements began in 1990, with more in 2003 and 2017; the 2021 Colors of Kindness pack added four new ones.
Q 22Crayola's 'Multicultural Crayons' and 'Colors of the World' packs represent what?
Skin tones
The 2020 line has 24 crayons covering nearly 40 skin tones with a gradient label on the box.
Q 23Why did Crayola change some of its 1994 Magic Scent crayons the following year?
Parents said they smelled edible
Cherry, chocolate and blueberry were dropped in favour of non-food smells.
Q 14What name did a public vote give the blue crayon that replaced Dandelion in 2017?
Bluetiful
The hue came from a pigment discovered by accident at Oregon State University.
Q 15The 2017 blue crayon was inspired by YInMn Blue, a pigment whose name is built from the chemical symbols of yttrium, indium and which element?
Manganese
Professor Mas Subramanian and student Andrew E. Smith stumbled on it in 2009 while researching electronics materials.
Q 16Which colour did fans vote to save from retirement for Crayola's 100th anniversary in 2003?
Burnt Sienna
Mulberry, Teal Blue, Blizzard Blue and Magic Mint were retired instead, making room for Mango Tango, Inchworm, Wild Blue Yonder and Jazzberry Jam.
Q 17Which of these was one of the 16 fan-named colours added to the 96 Big Box in 1993?
Macaroni and Cheese
Tickle Me Pink, Mauvelous, Purple Mountains' Majesty and Razzmatazz came from the same nationwide contest.
Q 18A special colour called 'Blue Ribbon' was produced in 1996 to celebrate what?
The 100 billionth crayon
It appeared only in limited-edition No. 96 boxes early that year and never joined the regular assortment.
Q 19Which children's TV host moulded a ceremonial milestone crayon at Crayola's plant in 1996?
Fred Rogers
Both Mister Rogers' Neighborhood and Sesame Street have run segments filmed at Crayola.
Q 20Crayola's first 120-count box appeared in which year?
1998
Twelve colours were added to hit the number, including Manatee, Eggplant, Cotton Candy and the metallic Antique Brass.
Q 24Crayola's first specialty crayons, introduced in 1972, were designed to do what?
Glow under black light
The eight fluorescents included Atomic Tangerine, Laser Lemon and Screamin' Green.
Q 25Which stretchy toy has Crayola owned the rights to since 1977?
Silly Putty
It began as a failed wartime rubber substitute; Peter Hodgson borrowed $147 to pack it into plastic eggs in 1950.
Q 26Crayola's bouncing putty took off in 1950 after being mentioned in which magazine?
The New Yorker
Peter Hodgson sold over 250,000 eggs in three days after the piece ran, then was nearly ruined when the Korean War put silicone on ration.
Q 27Crayola markers were launched in 1978 to coincide with what?
The crayon's 75th anniversary
Coloured pencils and a further line of markers followed in 1987.
Q 28Crayola crayons were inducted into the National Toy Hall of Fame in 1998, located in which city?
Rochester, New York
They were a founding member; the same year the US Postal Service put a Crayola box on a 32-cent stamp.
Q 29Which colour won Crayola's 'Color Census 2000' vote for America's favourite crayon?
Blue
Cerulean came second and Purple Heart third; George W. Bush picked Blue Bell and Tiger Woods chose Wild Strawberry.
Q 30The World's Largest Crayon, unveiled at the Crayola Experience in 2003, is what colour?
Blue
The 15-foot, 1,500-pound crayon was made from leftover bits ('leftolas') that children mailed in from across the country.