RV Trivia
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100 free RV trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
This RV trivia quiz is for anyone who has ever backed a trailer into a campsite, dumped a black tank or argued about Class A versus Class C. It runs from the horse-drawn Wanderer of 1884 and the world's first caravan club to the pandemic boom that put an RV in more than eleven million American driveways, taking in Wally Byam's aluminium Airstreams, the Iowa town that built the first Winnebagos, the Indiana county that calls itself the RV Capital of the World and the only motorhome ever built start to finish by a major automaker. It also covers the culture around the vehicles: KOA and Good Sam, boondockers in Quartzsite and Slab City, grey nomads, van life, and the RVs that stole films and TV shows, from Lucy and Desi's long, long trailer to Walter White's meth lab and the Winnebago that flew in Spaceballs. About a third of the questions are easy for anyone who has camped, a third need some RV-world knowledge, and the rest reward the full-timers who know which trailer NASA used to quarantine the Apollo 11 crew. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on recreational vehicles, manufacturers and films before publishing, and each question carries the sentence that establishes it. If you think one is wrong, use the report button and we will look again.
30 of 100 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The first known purpose-built RV, the horse-drawn Wanderer, was commissioned in 1884 in which country?
Britain
Britain: the Wanderer was built in Bristol by the Bristol Wagon and Carriage Works for the Scottish author Dr William Gordon Stables, who toured in it and wrote The Cruise of the Land Yacht Wanderer.
Q 02The world's first RV club, formed in 1907, was "The ___ Club". Which word fills the blank?
Caravan
It grew out of Britain's Gentlemen Gypsy movement, which promoted the restorative benefits of horse-drawn caravanning.
Q 03The first steam-driven motorhome, the Quo Vadis of 1900, was built in which country?
France
France built both pioneers: the steam-powered Quo Vadis in 1900 and, in 1902, the Passe-Partout, the first petrol-driven motorhome.
Q 04Which affordable car helped make lightweight tent trailers popular in the US from 1911?
The Ford Model T
The Ford Model T, cheap enough for ordinary families after 1908, put auto-camping within reach; lightweight folding camp trailers appeared around 1911, helped by better roads and new national parks.
Q 05Which small, lightweight 1950 vehicle is credited as the first "one box" RV seen in large numbers?
The Volkswagen Kombi
The Volkswagen Kombi, the Type 2 launched in 1950, was a light one-box van whose camper conversions sold in huge numbers through the 1950s and 60s, becoming the archetypal camper van.
Q 06Which brand, founded in 1931, alone outlasted the 400-plus US trailer makers of the 1930s?
Airstream
Airstream, founded by Wally Byam in 1931, was the only one of the roughly 400 US trailer makers of the 1930s to stay continuously in business into the 21st century.
Q 07The rounded aluminium body of Wally Byam's trailers is based on which earlier design?
The Bowlus Road Chief
Byam's 1936 Clipper copied the riveted aluminium shell of the Bowlus Road Chief, designed by aircraft builder William Hawley Bowlus in 1934, moving its front door to the side.
Q 08Wally Byam's company builds its aluminium trailers in which Ohio town?
Jackson Center
The plant opened there in July 1952; the brand is now part of Elkhart-based Thor Industries.
Q 09A modified airtight Airstream trailer served NASA as what after the Apollo 11, 12 and 14 missions?
A mobile quarantine facility
The Mobile Quarantine Facility, a converted trailer, held the crew from the recovery carrier until they reached the Lunar Receiving Laboratory in Houston; Apollo 13 never landed, so needed none.
Q 10Winnebago Industries was founded in 1958 in which Iowa town?
Forest City
Forest City, in Winnebago County, is where John K. Hanson set up the company in 1958; the motorhome plant stayed there after the headquarters moved to Eden Prairie, Minnesota, in 2021.
Q 11In 2018 Winnebago expanded into boat building by acquiring which company?
Chris-Craft
Chris-Craft, the powerboat maker founded in 1874 and based in Sarasota, Florida, was bought by Winnebago in June 2018, the motorhome builder's first move into marine products.
Q 12Roughly what share of US-built RVs came out of Indiana in the late 2010s?
About 85 percent
About 85 percent of US-built RVs came from northern Indiana in the late 2010s, where the largest makers and hundreds of suppliers cluster around one county.
Q 13The RV/MH Hall of Fame museum is located in which city?
Elkhart, Indiana
Elkhart, Indiana, the hub of the US RV industry, has housed the RV/MH Hall of Fame's 100,000-square-foot museum since it opened in 2007, with a gallery of historic trailers and motorhomes.
Q 21A pop-up camper is also known by what other name?
A tent trailer
A tent trailer, or fold-down camper, has canvas or vinyl sides that crank up at camp and collapse for towing, making it one of the lightest towables.
Q 22A teardrop trailer typically sleeps how many adults?
Two
Two: a teardrop's compact shell holds little more than a double bed, with a galley kitchen under the rear hatch; the classic designs date from 1930s magazine plans.
Q 23KOA, the franchised campground chain founded in 1962, is based in which city?
Billings, Montana
Billings, Montana, is where Dave Drum opened the first Kampgrounds of America site on the Yellowstone River in 1962 for travellers heading to the Seattle World's Fair; the company stayed headquartered there.
Q 14Which Elkhart-based company owns Jayco, Heartland RV and Wally Byam's aluminium-trailer brand?
Thor Industries
Thor Industries, formed in 1980 when Wade Thompson and Peter Orthwein bought the aluminium-trailer brand, added Heartland in 2010 and Jayco in 2016, and bought Europe's Erwin Hymer Group in 2019.
Q 15The GMC Motorhome of 1973 to 1978 was assembled in which Michigan city?
Pontiac
Pontiac, Michigan, home of GM's Truck and Coach division, built about 12,900 GMC Motorhomes between 1973 and 1978 in 23- and 26-foot lengths.
Q 16What was unusual about the GMC Motorhome's drivetrain?
It was front-wheel drive
It was front-wheel drive, borrowing the Oldsmobile Toronado's 455 V8 and transaxle, which left no driveshaft and allowed a low floor and profile other coach motorhomes could not match.
Q 17A motorhome with its engine mounted at the rear is known as what?
A pusher
A pusher has its engine at the back, pushing the coach along, and is usually a diesel; front-engined 'pullers' have traditionally run on petrol.
Q 18What do larger RVs use to gain living space once parked?
Slide-outs
Slide-outs are wall sections that roll outward on rails once the RV is parked, adding up to a few feet of floor width, then retract flush for travel.
Q 19A fifth-wheel trailer connects to the tow vehicle by way of what?
A kingpin into a horseshoe-shaped plate
A kingpin on the trailer locks into a horseshoe-shaped fifth-wheel plate mounted in the pickup bed, the same coupling that links semi-trailers to tractor units.
Q 20In North America, an RV carried in the bed of a pickup is called a truck camper or what?
A slide-in
A slide-in is lifted into the pickup bed and secured with tie-downs, leaving the truck free to be used alone once the camper is dropped on its jacks at camp.
Q 24What does the 'MH' stand for in the name of the RV/MH Hall of Fame?
Manufactured housing
MH is manufactured housing: the hall honours pioneers of both recreation vehicles and factory-built homes, industries that grew up side by side in northern Indiana.
Q 25Roughly how many Americans lived full-time in RVs in the early 2020s, by industry estimate?
One million
One million is the industry association's round estimate of Americans living full-time in RVs, a mix of retirees, remote workers and people priced out of housing.
Q 26In Australia, what is the slang term for a retiree who travels the country in an RV?
Grey nomad
Grey nomads are Australian retirees who spend months touring the outback towing a van or driving a motorhome, often heading north for winter along the coasts and the Stuart Highway.
Q 27Which desert festival is noted for strict rules on RV water leaks and generator use?
Burning Man
Burning Man, held on Nevada's Black Rock Desert playa, enforces a Leave No Trace rule: RVs must not drip grey water or waste onto the alkali flat, and generators are subject to noise rules.
Q 28Slab City, the off-grid RV community in California's Sonoran Desert, takes its name from what?
The concrete pads of an old Marine camp
Camp Dunlap was torn down after World War II, leaving the foundations that snowbirds now park on.
Q 29Which Arizona town of about 2,400 residents (2020 census) swells with RV campers every winter?
Quartzsite
Quartzsite, on Interstate 10 near the California line, hosts big winter RV and gem shows, and the surrounding BLM long-term visitor areas draw hundreds of thousands of campers between January and March.
Q 30Which Lincolnshire, Illinois RV retailer went public in 2016 with a quarter-billion-dollar IPO?
Camping World
Camping World, led by Marcus Lemonis of TV's The Profit, raised about $251 million in its October 2016 New York Stock Exchange debut; it also runs the Good Sam club.