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This Boise trivia quiz has 80 free questions with answers and covers Idaho's capital from the French trappers who called it the wooded river to the fastest-growing city in America: how the name is really pronounced, why the statehouse is heated by hot water from underground, who dreamed up the blue football field, and what gets dropped in the Grove Plaza on New Year's Eve. It takes in the Basque Block and Jaialdi, the Greenbelt and its painted dots, Treefort, Bogus Basin, the Old Penitentiary and its resident cat, and the potato fortune that seeded Micron. Easy questions open it (which river? which county?) and the later ones will test people who grew up here (when did the streetcars stop? how far apart are the Greenbelt DOTS?), so it suits a pub quiz on 8th Street, a classroom, a road trip or a game night with the family. Every answer has been checked against an encyclopaedia entry or the institution's own history, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
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Q 01By the best-known story, a French-speaking guide named Boise by shouting what at the sight of the river valley?
The woods!
"Les bois! Les bois!" is the tale told of Capt. Bonneville's party at what is now Bonneville Point on the Oregon Trail; an alternative version credits French Canadian trappers who called it "la rivière boisée", the wooded river.
Q 02How do most longtime Boise residents pronounce the city's name?
BOY-see
The pronunciation works as a shibboleth: outsiders tend to say BOY-zee, and in French it is simply Bwaz.
Q 03Boise is the county seat of which Idaho county?
Ada
Confusingly, Boise County lies to the northeast around Idaho City; the capital sits in Ada County, the state's most populous.
Q 04Which city was briefly Idaho's territorial capital before Boise took over in 1864?
Lewiston
The move followed the population shift south after gold strikes; the decision was so contested that it went to the territorial supreme court.
Q 05What is Boise's long-standing arboreal nickname?
City of Trees
The name took root in the 1860s and 1870s when early settlers planted orchards and downtown hotels led tree-planting drives in a high-desert valley.
Q 06Which Native peoples wintered in the Boise valley and fished its salmon runs before white settlement?
Shoshone and Bannock
In April 1869 the U.S. Army forcibly removed them to the Fort Hall reservation, a march remembered as Idaho's Trail of Tears.
Q 07The Idaho State Capitol is the only U.S. statehouse heated by what?
Geothermal water
The hot water is pumped from about 3,000 feet underground; the same resource has warmed homes on Warm Springs Avenue since the 1890s.
Q 08The Idaho State Capitol's sandstone was quarried from which landmark just southeast of downtown Boise?
Table Rock
The same quarry supplied stone for the Old Idaho Penitentiary, cut by the convicts themselves.
Q 09The Winged Victory statue in the Idaho State Capitol was a gift to the US from which country?
France
The plaster replica of the Nike of Samothrace arrived in 1949 as thanks for the liberation of France in World War II.
Q 10Looking up into the Idaho Capitol dome, visitors count 13 large stars and how many smaller ones?
43
The 43 small stars mark Idaho's admission as the 43rd state on July 3, 1890, one day before Independence Day.
Q 11Which company built the Boise Depot, the 1925 train station looking down Capitol Boulevard?
Union Pacific
The last passenger train to call there was Amtrak's Pioneer, discontinued in 1997.
Q 12The Boise River Greenbelt begins in the east at which dam?
Lucky Peak Dam
From there the trail runs more than 20 miles west to Eagle, and over 30 miles counting both banks and spurs.
Q 13The 1971 Greenbelt Ordinance required structures and parking to be set back at least how far from the river?
70 feet
The idea came from Boise's first comprehensive plan in 1962, and the first three parcels were donated in 1967.
Q 21J. R. Simplot first made money feeding hogs a low-cost diet of potatoes and what?
Wild horse meat
He sold the hogs at a profit when the market recovered and went into potato processing; he died in 2008 at 99 as the oldest billionaire on the Forbes 400.
Q 22Bogus Basin, Boise's ski area, likely owes its name to 19th-century swindlers who did what?
Made counterfeit gold dust
"Spelterers" heated lead filings with a pinch of real gold; the ski area itself opened in December 1942 with a rope tow.
Q 23What is dropped in Boise's Grove Plaza to ring in the New Year?
A giant potato
Q 14The white DOTS painted on the Greenbelt to mark distance from downtown are spaced how far apart?
Every tenth of a mile
Mile zero is near 8th and River Streets; a dot reading SE 5.3 puts you 5.3 miles east on the south bank.
Q 15Which vehicles are permitted on the Boise Greenbelt only with a special city permit?
Segways
Motorized vehicles are otherwise banned, and one stretch through Garden City's Riverside Village even bars bicycles.
Q 16Treefort Music Fest debuted in Boise in what year?
2012
The inaugural lineup included Built to Spill and The Joy Formidable; the local promoter Duck Club still runs it each March.
Q 17Which Treefort spin-off did President Obama praise during his 2015 visit to Boise?
Hackfort
The tech-focused offshoot later partnered with the Idaho Department of Labor; other forts include Dragfort, Kidfort and Podfort.
Q 18Treefort's late-March timing was partly inspired by bands heading home to the Northwest from which festival?
SXSW
It also lines up with the start of spring break for many Idaho schools; proceeds benefit community station Radio Boise.
Q 19In 1967 J. R. Simplot sealed a handshake deal to supply frozen french fries to which chain?
McDonald's
By 1972 all the chain's fries were frozen, and by 2005 Simplot supplied more than half of them.
Q 20Which Boise chipmaker received startup capital from J. R. Simplot's potato fortune in the early 1980s?
Micron Technology
By 1994 Simplot owned a 20 percent stake; the company remains the only major American maker of computer memory.
The Idaho Potato Drop is run by the Idaho New Year's Commission outside the Boise Centre convention hall.
Q 24In what year did Boise State first play on its blue turf?
1986
The debut was a 74–0 rout of Humboldt State; the school was still in the Big Sky Conference at the time.
Q 25Who came up with the idea of installing blue turf at Boise State?
Athletic director Gene Bleymaier
His reasoning: if the school was spending $750,000 on a new field, it should not be yet another green one. Players call it simply "The Blue."
Q 26What is the best-known nickname for Boise State's blue field?
Smurf Turf
ESPN's Chris Berman prefers "The Blue Plastic Tundra", a nod to Lambeau Field's frozen tundra.
Q 27In 2011 which league banned any non-green playing surface, dubbing it the "Boise Rule"?
The NFL
A persistent myth says the NCAA grandfathered Boise's field, but the NCAA has never restricted turf colour at all.
Q 28Which La Liga club played a 2015 friendly on real grass laid over Boise State's blue turf?
Athletic Bilbao
The Basque Soccer Friendly drew 21,948 to watch the club beat Club Tijuana 2–0, the first green surface in the stadium since 1985.
Q 29Boise State's football home went by what name for its first 44 seasons before a 2014 naming-rights deal?
Bronco Stadium
A grocery chain founded in Boise bought the naming rights; the playing field itself is still Lyle Smith Field.
Q 30Which team did Boise State stun in the Fiesta Bowl to cap its undefeated 2006 season?
Oklahoma
The Broncos returned to the Fiesta Bowl three seasons later and beat TCU to finish 14–0.