Virginia Beach Trivia
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49 free Virginia Beach trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Virginia Beach is where English America began, at Cape Henry in April 1607, and where a Guinness record for the world's longest pleasure beach now sits. These 41 Virginia Beach trivia questions cover the whole city: the 1963 merger with Princess Anne County that made it Virginia's biggest city, the 1792 Cape Henry Lighthouse that was the new nation's first federal building project, the Battle of the Capes that sealed Yorktown, the Norwegian Lady and the wreck of the Dictator, the Cavalier Hotel, and Edgar Cayce's hospital of dreams. The modern city gets its turn too: the three-mile boardwalk and the 34-foot King Neptune, the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, NAS Oceana and its Super Hornets, Mount Trashmore, the Virginia Aquarium, Back Bay and First Landing State Park, the East Coast Surfing Championships, the Neptune Festival, and Pharrell Williams's Something in the Water. Locals will find easy questions about the 757; visitors and transplants will meet plenty they did not know. Every answer is checked against Wikipedia and city and park records, and each question shows its source once you answer.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Roughly how many people lived in Virginia Beach, Virginia's biggest city, at the 2020 census?
About 460,000
The 2020 census counted 459,470 residents, about 460,000, putting Virginia Beach ahead of Chesapeake, Norfolk and Richmond as the most populous city in Virginia.
Q 02What Guinness record does the city hold?
Longest pleasure beach in the world
Guinness World Records lists Virginia Beach as the longest pleasure beach in the world, its sand running from the Chesapeake Bay shore south to the North Carolina line.
Q 03In 1963 Virginia Beach merged with which neighbouring jurisdiction to form the present-day city?
Princess Anne
Virginia Beach and Princess Anne County merged on January 1, 1963, after voters in both approved the consolidation; the new city kept the better-known resort name.
Q 04In a 2016 referendum, Virginia Beach voters rejected extending which Norfolk light-rail line?
The Tide
The Tide, Norfolk's light rail, opened in 2011; a November 2016 advisory referendum on extending it to Virginia Beach Town Center failed, and the city council dropped the project.
Q 05On what date in 1607 did Christopher Newport's colonists land at Cape Henry?
April 26
Christopher Newport's three ships made landfall at Cape Henry on April 26, 1607, after about four months at sea; the colonists moved up the James River to found Jamestown on May 14.
Q 06First Landing State Park was known until 1997 by what name?
Seashore
Seashore State Park, one of Virginia's six original state parks opened in 1936 and built by the Civilian Conservation Corps, was renamed First Landing in 1997 for the colonists' 1607 arrival at Cape Henry.
Q 07The 1792 Cape Henry Lighthouse holds what distinction in US history?
First federal construction project under the Constitution
Authorized by the first Congress in 1789 and finished in 1792, Cape Henry was the first federal construction project under the Constitution; contractor John McComb Jr. built it of sandstone before a cast-iron tower replaced it in 1881.
Q 08How tall is the 1881 cast-iron Cape Henry Lighthouse that replaced the original?
157 feet
The 1881 tower is 157 feet tall, an octagonal cast-iron lighthouse with black-and-white faces, built about 350 feet from the cracked 1792 sandstone original, which was kept as a monument.
Q 09The 1781 Battle of the Chesapeake off Cape Henry, which doomed Cornwallis, pitted Britain against whom?
The French
The French fleet under the Comte de Grasse, 24 ships of the line, held off Thomas Graves's 19 British ships on September 5, 1781, cutting Cornwallis off from the sea; he surrendered at Yorktown six weeks later.
Q 10How long is the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel that links Virginia Beach to the Eastern Shore?
17.6 miles
The 17.6-mile crossing opened on April 15, 1964, with two mile-long tunnels and four man-made islands, and saves about 95 miles of driving between Virginia Beach and Philadelphia.
Q 11Which crossing overtook the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel as the world's longest bridge-tunnel complex in 2018?
Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau
The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge, opened in October 2018 with 55 km of bridges and tunnel, took the title; the Chesapeake crossing is officially the Lucius J. Kellam Jr. Bridge-Tunnel.
Q 12Which installation is Virginia Beach's biggest employer and the East Coast's only master jet base?
Naval Air Station Oceana
Naval Air Station Oceana, the Navy's East Coast Master Jet Base, hosts the Atlantic Fleet's F/A-18 Super Hornet squadrons and employs more people than any other Virginia Beach institution.
Q 13How long is the concrete Virginia Beach boardwalk that runs north from Rudee Inlet?
Q 21An identical twin of Virginia Beach's Norwegian Lady stands in which Norwegian sister city?
Moss
Moss, the Dictator's home port, received an identical bronze by sculptor Ørnulf Bast, unveiled in September 1962 like Virginia Beach's; the two towns are sister cities.
Q 22The historic Cavalier Hotel opened on the oceanfront in which year?
1927
The Cavalier opened in April 1927 on a hill above the oceanfront; the Navy took it over as a training school in 1942, and it reopened in 2018 after a multi-year restoration.
Q 23Which 'Sleeping Prophet' founded the Association for Research and Enlightenment in 1931?
Edgar Cayce
Edgar Cayce, the 'Sleeping Prophet' who gave thousands of readings in a trance, moved to Virginia Beach in 1925 and founded the Association for Research and Enlightenment there in 1931; he died in 1945.
Three miles
The boardwalk runs three miles from Rudee Inlet north to about 40th Street, with a parallel bike path beside the concrete walkway; the first wooden boardwalk of 1888 ran only five blocks.
Q 14How tall is the bronze King Neptune statue that overlooks the boardwalk at 31st Street?
34 feet
Paul DiPasquale's bronze King Neptune stands 34 feet tall and weighs 12.5 tons; it was dedicated in September 2005 and gives Neptune Park at 31st Street its name.
Q 15The Neptune Festival, the city's biggest, has been held every September since which year?
1974
The Neptune Festival began in 1974 as a way to extend the tourist season past Labor Day; it fills September and ends with a Boardwalk Weekend whose sandsculpting championship is the centrepiece.
Q 16Which Virginia Beach museum occupies the 1903 life-saving station on the boardwalk at 24th Street?
Old Coast Guard Station
The Old Coast Guard Station was built in 1903 for the U.S. Life-Saving Service, passed to the Coast Guard in 1915 and has been a maritime museum since 1981.
Q 17Mount Trashmore Park, opened in 1974, was built on top of what?
A landfill
Mount Trashmore was made by layering compacted solid waste with clean soil over the city's old landfill, turning a dump into a public park with two man-made mountains and lakes when it opened in 1974.
Q 18Which Virginia Beach-born producer launched the Something in the Water festival in 2019?
Pharrell Williams
Pharrell Williams, born in Virginia Beach in 1973, staged the first Something in the Water on the oceanfront in April 2019; with Chad Hugo he formed the production duo The Neptunes.
Q 19Where did Pharrell and Chad Hugo, the future Neptunes, first meet?
A summer band camp
Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo met as seventh-graders at a summer band camp, where Williams played drums and Hugo saxophone; they later formed The Neptunes, producing hits for Nelly, Britney Spears and Jay-Z.
Q 20The Norwegian Lady statue commemorates the 1891 wreck of which Norwegian barque?
The Dictator
The Norwegian barque Dictator ran aground in a storm off Virginia Beach on March 27, 1891; Captain Jørgen Jørgensen survived but his wife and young son drowned, and the ship's figurehead was set up on the oceanfront as a memorial.
Q 24The Virginia Aquarium opened in 1986 as the 'Virginia' what?
Marine Science Museum
It opened in 1986 as the Virginia Marine Science Museum and took the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center name in 2006; its tanks hold more than 800,000 gallons of water.
Q 25Which surf contest has been held in Virginia Beach every summer since 1963?
East Coast Surfing Championships
The East Coast Surfing Championships began at Gilgo Beach, Long Island, in 1962 and moved to Virginia Beach's oceanfront in 1963, where the late-summer contest has been held every year since.
Q 26Virginia's Adam Thoroughgood House is now dated to about which year?
1719
Tree-ring dating places the house about 1719, built by Adam Thoroughgood's great-grandson; it had long been claimed as a 1636 house and was made a National Historic Landmark in 1960.
Q 27What had Adam Thoroughgood, who named the Lynnhaven River after King's Lynn, been when he arrived in Virginia in 1622?
An indentured servant
Adam Thoroughgood came to Virginia in 1622 as an indentured servant, worked off his term and rose to sit in the House of Burgesses; Norfolk takes its name from his home county in England.
Q 28Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge in southern Virginia Beach was established in which year?
1938
Established in 1938, Back Bay refuge protects more than 9,000 acres of dunes, marsh and beach that serve as a stop on the Atlantic Flyway for snow geese and tundra swans.
Q 29Which state park adjoins Back Bay refuge to the south, reaching down to the North Carolina line?
False Cape
False Cape State Park runs six miles along the Atlantic between Back Bay refuge and the North Carolina line; with no public road, visitors arrive on foot, by bike, by boat or on the refuge tram.
Q 30Which area code do locals use as a nickname for Virginia Beach and Hampton Roads?
757
757 has been the Hampton Roads code since it split from 804 in 1996, and locals wear it as shorthand for the region; the 948 overlay arrived in 2022.