New Orleans Trivia
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103 free New Orleans trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
63 free New Orleans trivia questions with answers. New Orleans has been French, Spanish, French again and American, and it never quite let go of any of them. This quiz covers the whole city: its founding on Chitimacha land in 1718, the Louisiana Purchase handover in Jackson Square, Andrew Jackson's improbable victory at Chalmette, the krewes and coconuts of Mardi Gras, Congo Square and the birth of jazz, and the food that makes visitors plan their day around lunch. Expect questions about beignets and chicory coffee, po' boys and muffulettas, the Saints and the Superdome, the world's oldest streetcar line, above-ground cemeteries, Marie Laveau, Storyville, the Lower Ninth Ward and the levee failures of 2005. Some are easy enough for anyone who has walked down Bourbon Street once; a few will only be answered by people who know why the airport code is MSY. Every answer has been checked against the city's documented history and carries a linked source, so you can settle any argument on the spot. Good for a pub quiz round, a classroom, or the drive down I-10.
30 of 103 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which town did New Orleans replace as the capital of French Louisiana?
Biloxi
Biloxi: soon after the capital moved in 1722, a hurricane blew down most of New Orleans, and it was rebuilt on the grid that is today's French Quarter.
Q 02New Orleans's namesake, the Duke of Orléans, ruled France as regent for which boy king?
Louis XV
Louis XV: his parents and his only surviving brother all died in 1712, which left the two-year-old next in line for the throne.
Q 03Who founded New Orleans?
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville chose the site partly because it was high ground on a sharp bend of the river.
Q 04Before Europeans arrived, the Choctaw name for the area, Bulbancha, translated as what?
Land of many tongues
Land of many tongues: the site was a trading hub where many Native peoples with different languages met to trade.
Q 05What do New Orleanians call the grassy median running down the middle of a boulevard?
The neutral ground
The neutral ground: on Canal Street, the wide median once divided the Creole French Quarter from the new American sector upriver.
Q 06Which six-year-old integrated New Orleans's William Frantz Elementary under federal marshals' escort?
Ruby Bridges
Ruby Bridges: nearly all white parents kept their children away, and only one teacher, Barbara Henry, agreed to teach her.
Q 07A New Orleans man's arrest in a whites-only train car led to which Supreme Court case?
Plessy v. Ferguson
Plessy v. Ferguson: a civil rights committee staged the 1892 arrest to test the law, but the Court upheld 'separate but equal' in 1896.
Q 08Why do so few buildings in the French Quarter date from the French colonial era?
Two great fires destroyed them
Two great fires destroyed them, in 1788 and 1794, and the city rebuilt in brick, so most of the Quarter's buildings date from after the blazes.
Q 09What is the French Quarter's other common name?
Vieux Carré
Vieux Carré means 'Old Square', and because the district sits on higher ground, it stayed largely dry when Hurricane Katrina flooded most of the city.
Q 10Bourbon Street takes its name from what?
France's royal family
France's royal family: engineer Adrien de Pauger named the street for the House of Bourbon in 1721, before bourbon whiskey even existed.
Q 11New Orleans became part of the United States through which 1803 deal?
The Louisiana Purchase
The Louisiana Purchase: US envoys had set out to buy New Orleans, and were stunned when France offered all of Louisiana for $15 million.
Q 12Which French Quarter bar is known as the home of the Hurricane cocktail?
Pat O'Brien's
Pat O'Brien's: distributors reportedly made bars take cases of rum to get whiskey, so the bar mixed the surplus into its fruity Hurricane.
Q 13Who commanded the American forces at the Battle of New Orleans on January 8, 1815?
Andrew Jackson
Q 21Which New Orleans newspaper kept publishing after Katrina forced it from its building, winning a Pulitzer Prize?
The Times-Picayune
The Times-Picayune: it published online only until it could print again, using another newspaper's presses in Houma.
Q 22As of 2025, what distinction does the St. Charles Avenue streetcar line hold?
The world's oldest operating streetcar line
The world's oldest operating streetcar line: it opened in 1835 with steam locomotives, switched to horse and mule cars, and was electrified in 1893.
Q 23Which playwright lived in New Orleans early in his career and set A Streetcar Named Desire there?
Andrew Jackson: his army lost fewer than 100 men against about 2,000 British casualties, and the fame of the victory later helped carry him to the White House.
Q 14The Battle of New Orleans was fought 15 days after which peace agreement had already been signed?
The Treaty of Ghent
The Treaty of Ghent: word of it hadn't crossed the Atlantic, and the US didn't ratify it until February 16, 1815, so the war wasn't officially over.
Q 15Which pirate led the privateers who fought alongside the Americans in 1815?
Jean Lafitte
Jean Lafitte traded his smugglers' help for a pardon, and President Madison granted it, but Lafitte soon went back to his illicit trade from Galveston Island.
Q 16Before it was renamed for a war hero, what was the French Quarter's main square called?
Place d'Armes
Place d'Armes was the colonial parade ground, and the Baroness de Pontalba later paid for its makeover with an iron fence and formal gardens.
Q 17Which engineer's pump system let New Orleans build on former swampland?
A. Baldwin Wood
A. Baldwin Wood's giant screw pumps, installed in the 1910s, drained enough swamp for the city to spread, and his pump designs were later used in Egypt, China and India.
Q 18As of 2025, the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway holds a Guinness World Record for what?
Longest continuous span over water
Longest continuous span over water: when China's Jiaozhou Bay Bridge was touted as longer in 2011, the Causeway disputed it, and Guinness now lists a separate 'continuous' title.
Q 19Lake Pontchartrain is technically what kind of body of water?
An estuary
An estuary: it joins the Gulf through the Rigolets and Lake Borgne while rivers pour in fresh water, so its water is brackish.
Q 20The day before Hurricane Katrina struck, New Orleans's mayor issued the city's first-ever what?
Mandatory evacuation order
Mandatory evacuation order: most residents left, but many people without cars or anywhere to go were stuck in the city when the water rose.
Tennessee Williams
Tennessee Williams took the title from a real transit line, Desire, which ran through the French Quarter to Desire Street until 1948.
Q 24Which open space in Louis Armstrong Park is famed for the music and dancing once held there?
Congo Square
Congo Square: on Sundays during the colonial and early American periods, enslaved and free people gathered there to buy and sell goods.
Q 25After a New Year's Eve arrest, young Louis Armstrong was sent to a boys' home, where he learned which instrument?
The cornet
The cornet: teacher Peter Davis taught him to play it properly, then chose him to lead the home's brass band.
Q 26The New Orleans airport code MSY comes from what?
Moisant Stock Yards
Moisant Stock Yards: aviator John Moisant died in a 1910 crash on the site, which became a stockyard bearing his name and later Moisant Field.
Q 27Which New Orleans jazz venue started out as an art gallery?
Preservation Hall
Preservation Hall: owner Larry Borenstein began inviting musicians to play sessions in his gallery, and in 1961 it became a music venue.
Q 28The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival is held annually at what venue?
The Fair Grounds Race Course
The Fair Grounds Race Course: only about 350 people came to the first festival in 1970, about half the number of performers, and it moved to the racetrack in 1972.
Q 29Fats Domino lived most of his life in which New Orleans neighbourhood, staying there through Katrina?
The Lower Ninth Ward
The Lower Ninth Ward: he stayed there as Katrina hit partly because his wife was ill, and the Coast Guard rescued him from his flooded home.
Q 30Which secret Carnival society was founded in New Orleans in 1856?
The Mistick Krewe of Comus
The Mistick Krewe of Comus: several founders had come from Mobile, whose Cowbellion de Rakin Society was part of their inspiration.