The East Coast
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50 free The East Coast trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
The East Coast of the United States runs from the Canadian border to the tip of Florida, and fourteen states have a shoreline on the Atlantic Ocean. This is where the first English colonies took root, where the Revolution was fought and won, and where many of the country's biggest cities, busiest ports and best-known beaches still sit within a day's drive of each other. This quiz covers the East Coast states and their geography: which state is which, the state capitals, the bays, capes, islands and rivers that shape the shoreline, and the mountains and wetlands just inland. It also takes in the history and culture the coast is known for, from early settlements and Revolutionary War sites to pirates, boardwalks and wild horses. It suits a class learning the Atlantic states, a family planning a road trip, or a quiz host who needs a ready-made geography round. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so a wrong guess still teaches something, and the questions can be printed for use on paper.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which state, the easternmost in the contiguous United States, is the only one bordering exactly one other state?
Maine
Maine has more forest cover than any other state, with over 80 percent of its area forested or unclaimed.
Q 02Which state, the smallest in the United States by area, is officially nicknamed the Ocean State?
Rhode Island
Rhode Island sits mostly on the mainland despite its name, and its bays and inlets give it about 400 miles of coastline.
Q 03Which of the original thirteen colonies has a Lake Erie waterfront but no shoreline on the Atlantic Ocean?
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania counts about 140 miles of waterfront, split between the Great Lake and a tidal river that leads to the ocean.
Q 04Which New York Harbor landmark, built around a framework by Gustave Eiffel, was a gift from the people of France?
Statue of Liberty
The Statue of Liberty's head and torch-bearing arm were finished first and exhibited at international expositions for publicity.
Q 05Which North Carolina beach town became world-famous when the Wright brothers first flew a powered airplane nearby?
Kitty Hawk
Kitty Hawk was only the nearest named settlement: the flights took off four miles south, where a town was founded 50 years later.
Q 06Which Florida city, founded by Spain, is the oldest continuously inhabited European settlement in the contiguous US?
St. Augustine
St. Augustine was founded in 1565 by Spanish admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, decades before the first lasting English colony.
Q 07Which bay, fed by more than 150 rivers and streams, is the largest estuary in the United States?
Chesapeake Bay
Chesapeake Bay drains a basin that covers parts of six states and all of Washington, D.C.
Q 08Which part of New York, home to both Brooklyn and Queens, stretches about 120 miles east into the Atlantic?
Long Island
Long Island is the most populous island in any US state or territory, and two of New York City's five boroughs sit on its western end.
Q 09Which island city, once home to Ernest Hemingway, is the southernmost city in the contiguous United States?
Key West
Key West sits roughly 95 miles north of Cuba, at the western end of the highway that links the Florida Keys.
Q 10Which state earned its nickname by becoming the first to ratify the United States Constitution?
Delaware
Delaware is the second-smallest state, just 96 miles long and never more than 35 miles across.
Q 11Which state, the only one where every county is classed as urban, is the most densely populated in America?
New Jersey
New Jersey is mostly suburban despite its crowding, and its roadside diners are an icon of the state.
Q 12Which state began as the last and southernmost of the original thirteen colonies, first settled at Savannah?
Georgia
Georgia's founding trustees planned a colony of small farmers and at first prohibited slavery there.
Q 13Which Florida capital was the only Confederate state capital east of the Mississippi not captured by Union forces?
Tallahassee
Tallahassee became the capital in 1824, after territorial delegates decided to hold their meetings at a halfway point.
Q 21Which Massachusetts peninsula, cut off from the mainland by a canal since 1914, juts into the Atlantic Ocean?
Cape Cod
Cape Cod kept its wild ocean shore because President John F. Kennedy made it a national seashore in 1961, when it was already slated for housing subdivisions.
Q 22Which footpath of almost 2,200 miles passes through 14 states and is walked end to end by thru-hikers?
Appalachian Trail
The Appalachian Trail was conceived by a forester, Benton MacKaye, who wrote his plan for it in 1921.
Q 23Which Interstate, the main road link between the cities of the Eastern Seaboard, crosses more states than any other?
I-95
I-95 only became one continuous route in 2018, when a new interchange closed a gap left by a cancelled freeway.
Q 14Which city, settled by Dutch fur traders at Fort Orange, is the capital of the state of New York?
Albany
Albany took its present name in 1664, when the English captured the Dutch colony and renamed the town for the Duke of Albany, the future King James II.
Q 15In which city's harbor did the Sons of Liberty dump about 340 chests of tea to protest the Tea Act?
Boston
Boston's tea raiders are usually pictured in costume, but few of the men dumping the tea were actually disguised as American Indians.
Q 16In which city did delegates adopt the Declaration of Independence inside the building now called Independence Hall?
Philadelphia
Philadelphia's Liberty Bell spent nine months hidden under a church floor during the Revolution, so the British could not recast it into munitions.
Q 17Which Massachusetts settlement was founded by the Pilgrims who crossed the Atlantic aboard the Mayflower?
Plymouth
Plymouth stood on a site that Captain John Smith had already surveyed and named before the Pilgrims arrived.
Q 18Which Virginia settlement, led for a time by Captain John Smith, was the first permanent English colony in the Americas?
Jamestown
Jamestown nearly died out: only about 60 colonists were still alive after the winter of 1609 to 1610, known as the Starving Time.
Q 19Which Florida headland, officially renamed for President Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, is a famous rocket launch site?
Cape Canaveral
Cape Canaveral carries one of the oldest surviving European place names in the United States, from a Spanish word for a bed of reeds or canes.
Q 20Which vast Florida wetland, nicknamed the River of Grass, shelters the Florida panther and the American crocodile?
Everglades
The Everglades are really a slow-moving river about 60 miles wide and over 100 miles long, flowing south to Florida Bay.
Q 24Through which New York Harbor immigration station did about 12 million newcomers pass between 1892 and 1954?
Ellis Island
Ellis Island's arrivals left a deep mark: by one estimate, two-fifths of Americans may be descended from them.
Q 25Which New York City borough, the smallest of the five by area, is home to Wall Street and Central Park?
Manhattan
Manhattan grew from a Dutch trading post that was named New Amsterdam, and it now houses the world's two largest stock exchanges.
Q 26Which Florida city, nicknamed the Magic City for its rapid growth, is the only major US city founded by a woman?
Miami
Miami stands on land once owned by Julia Tuttle, a citrus grower who had moved there from Cleveland.
Q 27Which river flows past Washington, D.C., and George Washington's home at Mount Vernon?
Potomac
The Potomac forms a boundary, with Maryland and the capital on one bank and Virginia and West Virginia on the other.
Q 28Which river, explored in 1609 by an Englishman sailing for the Dutch, flows from the Adirondacks to New York Bay?
Hudson
The Hudson's lower half is a tidal estuary lying in a fjord that was carved out by glaciers.
Q 29In which Massachusetts town were nineteen people hanged after the witch trials of 1692 and 1693?
Salem
Salem's condemned were hanged, never burned: the idea that witches were burned in America is popular but false.
Q 30Which seaside resort, whose street names fill the American Monopoly board, hosted the Miss America pageant from 1921?
Atlantic City
Atlantic City built its first boardwalk in 1870 to help hotel owners keep sand out of their lobbies.