JFK Trivia
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109 free JFK trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
John F. Kennedy served less than three years as president, yet few Americans have generated more trivia. This John F. Kennedy trivia quiz follows the whole arc: the sickly Harvard graduate whose PT boat was cut in half by a Japanese destroyer, the senator who won a Pulitzer he may not have written, the youngest man ever elected to the White House, and the president who stared down Khrushchev over Cuba and pointed the country at the Moon. It also covers Jackie, Camelot, the pink suit, Marilyn Monroe's birthday song, the eternal flame at Arlington and the airport, coin, space centre and library that carry his name, along with the events of November 22, 1963 and the Warren Commission that followed. Questions range from easy ones anyone who has watched a documentary can answer to hard ones for Kennedy obsessives. Every answer has been checked against a primary source, mostly the relevant Wikipedia article, and the citation is attached to each question.
30 of 109 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01John F. Kennedy became the first US president of which religious faith?
Roman Catholic
Roman Catholic faith dogged Kennedy's campaign, so in September 1960 he told a gathering of Protestant ministers that his church did not speak for him.
Q 02In which Massachusetts town was JFK born on May 29, 1917?
Brookline
Brookline is where Kennedy was born; after his death the family bought back the house, and his mother, Rose, recreated it as she remembered it.
Q 03JFK graduated from which university in 1940?
Harvard
Harvard gave Kennedy his degree in 1940, though he had begun college at Princeton and left within months.
Q 04What was the title of Kennedy's first book, published in 1940 from his senior thesis?
Why England Slept
Why England Slept, about Britain's unreadiness for war with Hitler, won over critics and became a bestseller.
Q 05In August 1943 the patrol boat JFK commanded, PT-109, was cut in half by what?
A Japanese destroyer
A Japanese destroyer rammed PT-109, and Kennedy towed a badly burned crewman to an island by a life-jacket strap clenched in his teeth.
Q 06Stranded after the PT-109 sinking, Kennedy carved a rescue message into what?
A coconut shell
A coconut shell carried Kennedy's carved plea for help, and two Solomon Islanders' daring canoe trip with it led to the crew's rescue.
Q 07Which decoration did Kennedy receive for his actions after the PT-109 sinking?
Navy and Marine Corps Medal
The Navy and Marine Corps Medal honored Kennedy for helping his marooned crew to safety, and the rescue made him a war hero back home.
Q 08Kennedy's older brother Joseph Jr., killed in 1944, was serving in what role?
Navy pilot
Joe Jr. was a Navy pilot killed on a 1944 bombing mission in Europe; his father's presidential hopes then fell on Jack, who won a House seat in 1946.
Q 09Which prize did Kennedy's Profiles in Courage win in 1957?
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize went to Profiles in Courage, about eight senators who defied party pressure, though aide Ted Sorensen later admitted drafting most chapters.
Q 10Who did Kennedy narrowly defeat in the 1960 presidential election?
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon lost that race narrowly, but came back eight years later to win the presidency in 1968.
Q 11Which president did Kennedy succeed in January 1961?
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower handed over to Kennedy three days after a farewell address warning Americans against the 'military-industrial complex'.
Q 12Who was Kennedy's running mate in 1960?
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson, the Senate majority leader from Texas, lost the nomination to Kennedy and was then picked to help hold the South.
Q 13What did Robert Frost end up doing at Kennedy's inauguration on January 20, 1961?
Reciting an older poem from memory
Q 21To end the Cuban Missile Crisis, the US secretly agreed to pull its Jupiter missiles from where?
Turkey
Turkey's Jupiter missiles went under a secret deal, while Kennedy publicly pledged not to invade Cuba; a Washington-Moscow hotline followed the next year.
Q 22Which food did a popular myth say Kennedy called himself in his 1963 'Ich bin ein Berliner' speech?
A jelly doughnut
A jelly doughnut is the myth's claim, but it falls flat in Berlin, where that pastry is called a Pfannkuchen, not a Berliner.
Q 23What kind of treaty did Kennedy's government sign with Britain and the Soviet Union in 1963?
A nuclear test ban
Reciting an older poem from memory was Frost's fallback: sun glare off the snow kept him from reading his new verses, so he recited The Gift Outright.
Q 14Which line comes from Kennedy's inaugural address?
Ask not what your country can do for you
Ask not what your country can do for you came from an address Kennedy prepared by having aide Ted Sorensen study Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.
Q 15Kennedy signed the executive order creating which volunteer organisation on March 1, 1961?
The Peace Corps
The Peace Corps grew from a late-night campaign speech Kennedy gave to students at the University of Michigan in October 1960.
Q 16The failed Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961 was carried out by whom?
CIA-trained Cuban exiles
CIA-trained Cuban exiles landed at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961, but Cuban forces quickly overwhelmed them, a humiliation months into Kennedy's presidency.
Q 17At the June 1961 Vienna summit, which Soviet leader did Kennedy admit had 'beat the hell out of me'?
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev pressed Kennedy hard over Berlin at Vienna, and two months later East Germany began building the Berlin Wall.
Q 18In May 1961, Kennedy told Congress America should land a man on the Moon by when?
Before the decade was out
Before the decade was out was his deadline, and astronauts landed on the Moon in July 1969, more than five years after his death.
Q 19Where did Kennedy give his famous 'We choose to go to the Moon' speech on September 12, 1962?
Rice University, Houston
Rice University, Houston hosted the speech in its stadium, where Kennedy said America chose the Moon not because it was easy, but because it was hard.
Q 20How many days did the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 last?
13
13 days of standoff ended when Moscow agreed to pull its missiles from Cuba in return for a public US pledge not to invade the island.
A nuclear test ban answered rising worldwide alarm over radioactive fallout from bomb tests in the atmosphere.
Q 24Which serious illness of the adrenal glands did Kennedy hide from the public throughout his career?
Addison's disease
Addison's disease was diagnosed in London in 1947 by a doctor who gave him less than a year to live, yet he lived 16 more years on steroid treatments.
Q 25What colour was the Chanel suit Jacqueline Kennedy wore in the Dallas motorcade on November 22, 1963?
Bright pink
Bright pink and stained with blood, the suit stayed on as she stood beside the new president at his swearing-in that afternoon.
Q 26Jacqueline Kennedy likened her husband's presidency to what in a Life interview after his death?
Camelot
Camelot was the Broadway musical Kennedy loved, and a week after his death she urged journalist Theodore White to frame his Life article around it.
Q 27Which star sang 'Happy Birthday, Mr. President' to Kennedy at Madison Square Garden in 1962?
Marilyn Monroe
Marilyn Monroe sang it in 1962 in a famed dress that sold for $4.8 million in 2016 and that Kim Kardashian wore to the 2022 Met Gala.
Q 28Which post did Kennedy's younger brother Robert hold in his administration?
Attorney General
Attorney General Robert Kennedy served from 1961 to 1964, then won a Senate seat from New York, which he held until his assassination in 1968.
Q 29Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963 while riding in a motorcade through which Dallas location?
Dealey Plaza
Dealey Plaza is where the shots came; Texas Governor John Connally, riding in the same car, was also hit but recovered.
Q 30From which building did Lee Harvey Oswald fire at the presidential motorcade?
The Texas School Book Depository
The Texas School Book Depository had hired Oswald weeks earlier, and deputies later found a rifle stuffed between boxes on its sixth floor.