UMass Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press

Massachusetts at a Glance
A User's Guide to the Bay State

Jack Tager

Trivia Quiz

1. The state bird of Massachusetts is:
a. English Sparrow
b. Wild Turkey
c. Chickadee
d. Bald Eagle

2. Which is NOT a county in the state?
a. Barnstable
b. Kings
c. Hampden
d. Norfolk

3. After Boston which city is the next largest?
a. Springfield
b. Lowell
c. Cambridge
d. Worcester

4. The principal river of the state is:
a. Charles
b. Connecticut
c. Merrimack
d. Mystic

5. The Massachusetts woman who founded the Red Cross is:
a. Louise Day Hicks
b. Julia Ward Howe
c. Clara Barton
d. Alice Stone Blackwell

6. The Massachusetts author of Looking Backward is:
a. Nathaniel Hawthorne
b. Herman Melville
c. Jack Kerouac
d. Edward Bellamy

7. Which of the following Massachusetts abolitionists was a former slave?
a. Wendell Phillips
b. Frederick Douglass
c. Thomas Wentworth Higginson
d. William Lloyd Garrison

8. Aside from Ralph Waldo Emerson, who was a noted Transcendentalist of the nineteenth century?
a. Daniel Webster
b. Louisa May Alcott
c. Anne Bradstreet
d. Henry David Thoreau

9. Which Native American proved invaluable to the Pilgrims in the early days of settlement?
a. Pocahontas
b. Metacom (King Philip)
c. Squanto
d. Crispus Attucks

10. Proposition 2 1/2
a. Puts a limit on property taxes
b. Allows for the initiative and the referendum
c. Prohibits the sale of birth control devices in the state
d. Calls for the testing of students in English and Math as a high school graduation requirement

11. The most famous illustration of the Boston Massacre is an etching done by:
a. John Singleton Copley
b. Charles Bulfinch
c. Norman Rockwell
d. Paul Revere

12. The founder of the Christian Science faith was:
a. Dorothea Dix
b. Anne Hutchinson
c. Mary Baker Eddy
d. Isabella Steward Gardner

13. In the history of the Boston Red Sox, the player with the highest batting average is:
a. Babe Ruth
b. Ted Williams
c. Cy Young
d. Smoky Joe Woods

14. Which of the following U.S. presidents was NOT born in Massachusetts?
a. John F. Kennedy
b. George H. W. Bush
c. John Adams
d. Calvin Coolidge

15. The summer home of the Boston Symphony is:
a. Walden Pond
b. Tanglewood
c. Mohawk Trail
d. Sturbridge Village

16. All but ONE of the following were connected to events of the American Revolution:
a. Beacon Hill
b. Old North Church
c. Breed’s Hill
d. North Bridge

17. The Massachusetts poet who wrote the Song of Hiawatha is:
a. Robert Frost
b. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
c. Robert Frost
d. Anne Bradstreet

18. The U.S. Supreme Court Justice born in Massachusetts and wounded in the Civil War is:
a. Louis Brandeis
b. Roger Taney
c. Daniel Webster
d. Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.

19. The lawyer known for defending and securing the acquittal of the British soldiers involved in the Boston Massacre is:
a. Thomas Hutchinson
b. Andrew Oliver
c. John Adams
d. James Otis

20. Robert Kennedy, assassinated while running for the presidency in 1968, was U.S. Senator from which state?
a. Massachusetts
b. Connecticut
c. California
d. New York

21. A scrimshander is:
a. a person with too much leisure
b. a sailor who carves designs on bone, ivory, and wood
c. a weaver noted for intricate whale and fish designs
d. a sea cook specializing in fish chowders

22. Until 1820 the following state was part of Massachusetts:
a. Vermont
b. New Hampshire
c. Maine
d. Connecticut

23. The nickname of Massachusetts is:
a. Baked Bean State
b. Puritan State
c. Old Colony State
d. Bay State

24. The Massachusetts member of the Lowell family who wrote the poem For the Union Dead is:
a. Amy Lowell
b. James Russell Lowell
c. Robert Lowell
d. Francis Cabot Lowell

25. The nation’s first women’s college is:
a. Smith
b. Mount Holyoke
c. Radcliff
d. Wellesley

Answers:
1c; 2b; 3d; 4b;5c; 6d; 7b; 8d; 9c; 10a; 11d; 12c; 13b; 14d; 15b; 16a; 17b; 18d; 19c; 20d; 21b; 22c; 23d; 24c; 25b

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