This patriotic trivia quiz has 80 free questions with answers and covers the symbols and songs of the United States rather than just the Fourth of July. You will meet the flag (why 13 stripes, when the 50th star arrived, whether Betsy Ross really sewed the first one), a full Flag Day round on how June 14 became a holiday and the teacher who campaigned for it, the national anthem and the poem behind it, the Pledge of Allegiance and its 1954 rewrite, the Great Seal's eagle and its arrows, Uncle Sam, the Liberty Bell, the Statue of Liberty, Mount Rushmore, and the songs America sings on holidays, from 'God Bless America' to 'Yankee Doodle'. It works for a Flag Day, Memorial Day or Veterans Day gathering, a classroom civics warm-up, a Fourth of July party round, or a citizenship-test practice session. Roughly a third of the questions are easy enough for kids; the rest climb toward the details only history buffs know. Every answer has been checked against Wikipedia and primary sources such as the US Code and the Smithsonian, and each explanation adds one detail worth repeating.
30 of 80 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01How many stripes are on the flag of the United States?
13
They stand for the thirteen British colonies that won independence; the stars stand for the states.
Q 02The 50-star US flag was adopted in 1960 after which state joined the Union?
Hawaii
It became the 27th official design in July 1960 and has been in use longer than any other version.
Q 03Which president ordered the 50-star flag on August 21, 1959?
Dwight Eisenhower
The design became official the following July.
Q 04In 1795 the flag briefly grew to 15 stars and stripes for Kentucky and which other new state?
Vermont
That 15-stripe version is the one that flew over Fort McHenry and inspired the national anthem.
Q 05Which 19th-century sea captain coined the nickname 'Old Glory' for a flag his mother gave him in 1824?
William Driver
He hid it from Confederates during the Civil War and later flew it over the Tennessee capitol in Nashville.
Q 06Who spread the story that Betsy Ross sewed the first Stars and Stripes from George Washington's sketch?
Her descendants
Historians call the tale apocryphal; another seamstress, Rebecca Young, was also claimed to have made the first flag.
Q 07Under the Flag Code, must a flag that touches the ground be destroyed?
No, that is a myth
The American Legion and state governments have confirmed the rule requires no such thing.
Q 08The US Flag Code became public law in which year?
1942
It bans using the flag for advertising or printing it on cushions and handkerchiefs.
Q 09Which president designated June 14 as Flag Day by proclamation in 1916?
Woodrow Wilson
Congress made it official in 1949; June 14 is also the US Army's birthday.
Q 10Which state was the first to make Flag Day a state holiday, in 1937?
Pennsylvania
The celebration began in the small town of Rennerdale.
Q 11The words of the national anthem were originally a poem with what title?
Defence of Fort M'Henry
The name we know came from a Baltimore music-store owner who published words and tune together.
Q 12Francis Scott Key witnessed the bombardment of Fort McHenry during which war?
The War of 1812
The British attack force fired on the fort for 25 hours.
Q 13The tune of the national anthem was borrowed from a song written for a gentlemen's club in which city?
London
John Stafford Smith wrote 'The Anacreontic Song' for the Anacreontic Society of amateur musicians.
Q 21The straight-arm 'Bellamy' gesture for the Pledge was dropped in World War II because it resembled what?
The Nazi salute
Americans now place a hand over the heart instead.
Q 22What was Francis Bellamy's day job when he wrote the Pledge?
Magazine circulation manager
He was a Baptist minister and Christian socialist working for The Youth's Companion.
Q 23What does the Latin motto 'E pluribus unum' on the Great Seal mean?
Out of many, one
The phrase has exactly 13 letters, and the seal is packed with other thirteens too.
Q 14How many stanzas does the full poem behind the US national anthem have?
Four
Almost nobody sings past the first, but all four officially make up the anthem.
Q 15Which president signed the 1931 law making 'The Star-Spangled Banner' the official national anthem?
Herbert Hoover
Before then, songs like 'Hail, Columbia' and 'My Country, 'Tis of Thee' served unofficially.
Q 16In which year's World Series was the anthem first played at a baseball game, during Game One's seventh-inning stretch?
1918
Playing it before every game only became routine during World War II.
Q 17Which singer performed the wrong lyrics to the anthem before Super Bowl XLV in 2011?
Christina Aguilera
She replaced the 'ramparts' line with a mangled version of the second line.
Q 18Which museum has housed the huge Fort McHenry flag that inspired the anthem since 1964?
National Museum of American History
It was the largest battle flag ever flown at the time, sewn by Mary Pickersgill and her nieces.
Q 19The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 to mark the 400th anniversary of what?
Columbus's arrival in the Americas
On October 21, 1892, more than 10,000 schoolchildren recited it together for the first time.
Q 20The words 'under God' were added to the Pledge of Allegiance in which year?
1954
President Eisenhower signed the change into law on Flag Day.
Q 24On the Great Seal, the bird holds an olive branch and a bundle of how many arrows?
13
Together they mean the country wants peace but is always ready for war.
Q 25Which secretary of the Continental Congress largely designed the Great Seal, first used in 1782?
Charles Thomson
William Barton helped; the seal still authenticates certain federal documents.
Q 26'In God We Trust' became the official national motto in which year?
1956
It replaced 'E pluribus unum', which had served as the de facto motto since the Great Seal was designed.
Q 27'In God We Trust' first appeared on US money in 1864 on which coin?
The two-cent piece
The motto grew out of the Civil War, when Union supporters wanted to show their faith and boost morale.
Q 28Which animal officially became the national bird of the United States by an act of Congress in 2024?
Bald eagle
It had been on the Great Seal since 1782 but was only 'unofficially' the national bird until then.
Q 29What is the truth about the legend that Benjamin Franklin wanted the turkey as the national symbol?
There is no evidence he ever publicly supported it
He did privately grumble about the eagle in a letter to his daughter, which is where the story comes from.
Q 30Which animal became the national mammal of the United States in 2016?
American bison
Both 'buffalo' and 'bison' are considered correct names for it in American English.