History & Myths · American history
American History Trivia Quiz
We The People The United States from 1776 to the moon: presidents' odd stories, rebels, outlaws and the real history behind Hamilton and Oppenheimer.
195 questions · 2 to 12 players, or solo · Typed answers, close enough counts
About this quiz
This American History Trivia Quiz has 195 questions: 69 easy, 78 medium and 48 hard. It is free. Play it with friends in a room for 2 to 12 players, on phones or in a browser, or play it solo. Type your answers: close enough counts, so a small typo still scores.
Sample questions
20 of the 195 American history questions in this pack. Think of your answer, then open it.
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At the first Battle of Bull Run in 1861, a fellow officer pointed to a Confederate general 'standing like a stone wall'. What was that general's surname?
Show answer
Jackson
The nickname stuck for good, and he became one of Robert E. Lee's most trusted generals.
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Family stories often say an inspector at which New York immigration island changed great-grandpa's surname on arrival? Historians call it a myth.
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Ellis Island
Inspectors only checked names against ship lists written in Europe. Most name changes were made later, by the immigrants themselves.
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In 1872, campaigner Susan B. Anthony was arrested in Rochester, New York, for doing what? She was later fined $100 and refused to pay.
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Voting
She told the judge she'd never pay a dollar of the fine, and she never did. In 1979 she went on the dollar coin.
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After Rosa Parks was arrested in December 1955, Black residents of which Alabama city refused to ride its buses for over a year, walking or sharing cars instead?
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Montgomery
The boycott lasted 381 days and ended only after the Supreme Court ruled bus segregation illegal. It made a young Dr King famous.
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Boston's 1773 protest targeted a British law letting one trading company sell its cargo cheaply in the colonies. Which company, then taking over India?
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East India Company
The company was near bankruptcy, which is why Britain passed the Tea Act. The cargo it lost in Boston had come from China.
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In 1953, Eisenhower's plane, flying as 'Air Force 8610', ended up in the same airspace as an airliner with the same number. Which famous call sign was created to stop it happening again?
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Air Force One
It's not one plane: any Air Force aircraft gets the call sign when the president is aboard. The blue-and-white look came in 1962.
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In October 1957, which beeping Soviet sphere, the first man-made object in orbit, shocked America so much that NASA was set up the next year?
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Sputnik
It was a shiny metal ball 58 cm wide. Eisenhower signed the law creating NASA in 1958, and the Space Race was on.
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President Nixon, a keen player of which game, had a one-lane alley built under the White House's North Portico?
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Bowling
Harry Truman had first put lanes in the White House in 1947. The Nixon lane is still there under the north entrance.
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At Saratoga, a monument honours a war hero's badly wounded leg but leaves out his name, because he later switched sides. Whose leg is it?
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Benedict Arnold
The 1887 Boot Monument calls him only the 'most brilliant soldier' of the Continental Army.
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Which French marquis defied his own king, bought a ship with his own money and sailed off at 19 to fight beside George Washington?
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Lafayette
He named his son Georges Washington Lafayette, and on a return visit in 1824 he wept at Washington's grave.
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After marching 60,000 troops from Atlanta to the coast in 1864, which Union general wired Lincoln offering him the city of Savannah as a Christmas present?
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William Tecumseh Sherman
His march wrecked railways and farms to break the South's ability to fight, a strategy known as 'total war'.
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Which escaped slave turned great speaker became the most photographed American of the 1800s, more than even Lincoln, using portraits to fight racist cartoons?
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Frederick Douglass
He sat for over 160 portraits between 1841 and his death in 1895, usually staring straight into the lens.
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Which motor-racing series grew out of Prohibition, when Appalachian moonshine runners souped up their cars to outrun the police?
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NASCAR
When Prohibition ended, the drivers kept their fast cars and raced each other. Ex-moonshiner Junior Johnson joined its Hall of Fame.
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Which president is the only one ever born on the Fourth of July, in 1872 in a tiny Vermont village?
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Calvin Coolidge
He was born in Plymouth Notch, Vermont, and took the oath of office there too, sworn in by his own father in 1923.
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Charles Lindbergh's plane for his 1927 solo flight to Paris had a big fuel tank where the windscreen should be. What did he use to see ahead?
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Periscope
Putting the fuel in front kept him safer in a crash. He could also turn the plane to peek out of a side window.
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Hoping to warm Americans to Britain before WWII, FDR hosted King George VI at a 1939 picnic in New York and served him which very American food?
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Hot dogs
It was the king's first ever one. FDR's mother had been appalled at serving royals such a casual menu.
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Abraham Lincoln is the only president to hold a patent. His invention used inflatable bags to lift what over sandbars?
Show answer
Boats
His boats had run aground twice on river trips. The idea was never used, but his wooden model is at the Smithsonian.
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Which president gave the longest inauguration speech ever, about 8,400 words on a cold, wet day without a coat or hat, and was dead one month later?
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William Henry Harrison
He had the shortest presidency ever: 31 days. His grandson Benjamin Harrison became president too, in 1889.
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Legend says one president got stuck in the White House bathtub. That's a myth, but his real tub was so big that four workmen once posed sitting in it. Who was he?
Show answer
William Howard Taft
The porcelain tub was over seven feet long and weighed about a ton. No record shows he ever got stuck in any bath.
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After winning the 1948 election, a grinning Harry Truman held up a Chicago newspaper whose early edition had already declared him the loser. What did its famous headline say?
Show answer
Dewey Defeats Truman
The Chicago Daily Tribune had printed early to beat a strike and trusted the polls. Truman won the upset by over two million votes.
How to play with friends
- Start a room. Open this quiz in Braggit, already picked for you. It plays in any browser or the app.
- Invite your friends. Share the room code or link. Friends join from their own phones, in the same room or over a video call.
- Type, wager, brag. Everyone types an answer before the timer runs out. Wager points when you are sure, then share your brag card.
Questions about this quiz
How many questions are in the American History Trivia Quiz?
195. Each game plays a round of them, so you can come back for more.
Can I play the American History Trivia Quiz with friends online?
Yes. Start a room with this quiz, share the room code or link, and 2 to 12 players join from the Braggit app or any browser. You can also play it solo.
Is the American History Trivia Quiz free?
Yes. Play it free in your browser or in the Braggit app.
Do I have to spell the answers exactly?
No. You type your answers, and Braggit accepts close spellings, so a small typo still scores.
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