Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
50 free Columbus, Ohio trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
43 free Columbus, Ohio trivia questions with answers. This Columbus Ohio trivia quiz is for people who live in the 614 and for anyone who has ever wondered why the biggest city in Ohio is the one nobody outside Ohio can place on a map. It covers the founding in 1812 on a wooded ridge opposite Franklinton, the Statehouse that famously lacks a dome, the flood that remade the riverfront, the wooden arches that gave the city a nickname and the annexation strategy that made it Ohio's largest city. Sport gets its share: Ohio Stadium and Script Ohio, the Blue Jackets' first playoff series win, the Crew as a charter MLS club, the Clippers and Jack Nicklaus's tournament in Dublin. So do the businesses that started here (Wendy's, White Castle's home base, Nationwide, Battelle and the photocopier, Victoria's Secret under Les Wexner) and the places locals send visitors: German Village, the Short North, North Market, COSI, Franklin Park Conservatory, Topiary Park and the zoo Jack Hanna made famous. The early questions are easy for any resident; the later ones will test a Columbus history buff. Every answer was checked against a reference page and shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Columbus was founded in 1812 at the confluence of the Olentangy River and which other river?
Scioto
The site was dense forest used only as a hunting ground; the state chose it for its central location after the capital had bounced between Chillicothe and Zanesville.
Q 02Lucas Sullivant's 1797 settlement, the first in what is now Columbus, was named after which American?
Benjamin Franklin
Franklinton sat on the west bank of the forks; Columbus annexed it in 1837 and it was devastated by the Great Flood of 1913.
Q 03In which year did Columbus officially become the capital of Ohio?
1816
It was planned as the capital from the start; the city was not chartered until 1834, when it had about 3,500 people.
Q 04With a 2020 census population of 905,748, Columbus ranked where among US cities?
14th
That also makes it the second-biggest city in the Midwest after Chicago and the third-largest state capital after Phoenix and Austin.
Q 05Which mayor's water-for-annexation tactic made Columbus the largest Ohio city by land area?
Jim Rhodes
Rhodes later served four terms as governor; the strategy is why Columbus overtook Cleveland in population by the early 1990s.
Q 06Columbus earned the nickname 'The Arch City' from what?
Wooden arches spanning High Street
The arches lit the street and powered the streetcars; torn down in 1914, they were rebuilt in metal in 2002.
Q 07The Great Flood of 1913, which killed more than 90 people in Columbus, devastated which neighbourhood?
Franklinton
The Army Corps of Engineers then widened the Scioto through downtown; a floodwall finished in 2004 finally let the neighbourhood redevelop.
Q 08Up to how many Confederate prisoners did Camp Chase in the Hilltop neighbourhood hold?
9,000
More than 2,000 Confederate soldiers remain buried there, one of the largest Confederate cemeteries in the North.
Q 09The Ohio Statehouse is famous for lacking what feature that visitors expect on a capitol building?
A dome
Its architects swapped the rounded top for a low conical roof on the cupola; the Greek Revival building took from 1839 to 1861 to finish.
Q 10The Ohio Statehouse opened to the public on 7 January of which year, after 18 years of construction?
1857
Its 18-foot foundations were laid by prison labour gangs rumoured to be full of masons jailed for minor infractions.
Q 11Ohio State University was founded in 1870 under what original name?
Agricultural and Mechanical College
Its full name was the Ohio Agricultural and Mechanical College, created under the Morrill Act on the former Neil estate over the objections of farming interests.
Q 12Ohio Stadium, 'The Horseshoe', opened in 1922 with a seating capacity of roughly how many?
66,000
Expansions took it past 100,000 by 2001; it is the third-largest on-campus football stadium in the country and is nicknamed 'The House That Harley Built' after Chic Harley.
Q 13Which Ohio State running back is the only player ever to win the Heisman Trophy twice?
Archie Griffin
Q 21Dave Thomas opened the first Wendy's in downtown Columbus on 15 November of which year?
1969
He named it after his daughter Melinda Lou; the original store ran as a museum-restaurant until it closed in 2007, and the company moved its headquarters to Dublin, Ohio, in 2006.
Q 22Wendy's square patties were modelled on Kewpee Hamburgers in Dave Thomas's home town. Which town?
Kalamazoo, Michigan
The corners sticking out of the round bun were meant to suggest plenty of meat.
Q 23In which city was White Castle, credited as the world's first fast-food hamburger chain, founded in 1921?
Wichita
Its sliders sold for five cents; Time named the White Castle slider the most influential burger of all time in 2014.
Ohio State's seven Heisman winners rank second all-time; its first paid coach lost his opening game in 1892 to a team coached by John Heisman himself.
Q 14In the marching band's Script Ohio, which instrument's player traditionally dots the 'i'?
Sousaphone
A fourth- or fifth-year player struts out with the drum major near the end of 'Le Régiment de Sambre et Meuse'; the first script Ohio on a field was actually made by Michigan's band.
Q 15The Columbus Blue Jackets' name and logos are inspired by Ohio's contribution to what?
The Civil War
They joined the NHL as an expansion team in 2000, and their first playoff series win came in 2019 with a sweep of the Presidents' Trophy-winning Tampa Bay Lightning.
Q 16The Columbus Crew won their first MLS Cup in which year?
2008
They were one of the ten charter clubs of 1996 and added further titles in 2020 and 2023; their old stadium was the first built specifically for an MLS team.
Q 17Where did the Columbus Crew play home games from 1996 to 1998, before their own ground opened?
Ohio State's Horseshoe
Their first game there in April 1996 drew 25,266; Brian McBride was the first overall pick in the first MLS draft.
Q 18The Columbus Clippers of the International League are the Triple-A affiliate of which MLB team?
Cleveland Guardians
They play at Huntington Park, opened in 2009; Columbus briefly had its own major league club, the Buckeyes, in 1883 and 1884.
Q 19Nicklaus's Memorial Tournament is held at Muirfield Village in which Columbus suburb?
Dublin
Nicklaus grew up in the Columbus area and designed the course himself; it opened in 1974.
Q 20Which celebrity hosts the Columbus sports festival drawing some 22,000 athletes?
Arnold Schwarzenegger
It has grown to eight Olympic sports and 80 events, making it one of the biggest multi-sport gatherings in the country.
Q 24Nationwide, one of the city's Fortune 500 companies, began in 1926 as an insurer for which group?
Farmers
Farm Bureau Mutual was set up because farmers were paying city rates for car insurance despite having fewer accidents; it started with over 1,000 policyholders and a $10,000 loan.
Q 25Battelle Memorial Institute's development of Chester Carlson's dry-copying idea led to which company?
Xerox
Battelle, founded in 1929, is the world's largest private R&D foundation and also worked on the Universal Product Code and the technology behind the compact disc.
Q 26Which Columbus retail magnate bought the five-store Victoria's Secret chain in 1982?
Les Wexner
Roy Raymond had founded it in 1977 after an embarrassing department-store shopping trip; Wexner's L Brands was one of six Columbus Fortune 500 firms in 2019.
Q 27Because its demographic mix makes it a 'typical' American city, Columbus is widely used by chains as what?
A test market
Restaurant chains born here include Bob Evans, Donatos, Max & Erma's, Charleys Philly Steaks and Steak Escape.
Q 28In 2023, which chipmaker announced a $20 billion factory in the Columbus area?
Intel
Honda and LG Energy Solutions also announced a $4.4 billion battery plant, and defence firm Anduril chose the city for its 'Arsenal-1' factory.
Q 29Which Columbus museum, in the former Central High School since 1999, is among America's top science centres?
COSI
The name is short for Center of Science and Industry; the Wexner Center is Ohio State's contemporary art gallery.
Q 30Columbus's Topiary Park recreates which famous painting in clipped shrubbery?
Seurat's La Grande Jatte
It sits downtown on the grounds of the old Deaf School; the Franklin Park Conservatory, the city's botanical garden, dates from 1895.