Q 01/05

For roughly how long did William Penn actually live in Pennsylvania, the colony he founded?

A) About 1 year

B) About 4 years

C) About 12 years

D) About 36 years

Answer · why

B) About 4 years

About 4 years is all William Penn spent in America, split across two visits in 1682–84 and 1699–1701. Money troubles and court politics kept pulling h...

Q 02/05

After 1909, one cereal company's advertising named William Penn as the man pictured on its boxes of what?

A) Oats

B) Wheat

C) Corn

D) Rice

Answer · why

A) Oats

Quaker Oats advertising called its logo figure William Penn, the standard bearer of the Quakers. The company has since said the man on the box does no...

Q 03/05

Which childhood disease cost William Penn his hair, leaving him to wear wigs for most of his life?

A) Measles

B) Diphtheria

C) Smallpox

D) Typhoid

Answer · why

C) Smallpox

Smallpox struck William Penn as a small boy and took his hair with it. The illness also prompted his parents to move the family out to a country estat...

Q 04/05

At his 1670 trial for street preaching, William Penn was jailed for contempt after refusing to remove what?

A) His sword

B) His gloves

C) His cloak

D) His hat

Answer · why

D) His hat

His hat stayed on because Quakers would not bare their heads to social superiors, holding that all men were equal under God. The gesture sent Penn to ...

Q 05/05

The most authentic portrait of the pacifist Quaker William Penn shows him at 22 dressed in what?

A) A judge's robes

B) A suit of armor

C) A naval uniform

D) A monk's habit

Answer · why

B) A suit of armor

A suit of armor appears in the 1666 portrait, painted after Penn helped put down a rebellion as a young soldier. Soon afterward he joined a faith that...