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This New Mexico trivia quiz has 70 free questions with answers and covers the Land of Enchantment from the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 and the Santa Fe Trail to statehood in 1912, the Trinity test and the Roswell balloon that launched a thousand UFO theories. It takes in Santa Fe and Albuquerque, the Balloon Fiesta, Carlsbad Caverns, White Sands, Chaco-era pueblos and the Long Walk, plus the state symbols that make New Mexico odd in the best way: an official question (red or green?), a state cookie, a state aroma and a female-only state reptile. Easy questions open it (what is the capital, which show was filmed in Albuquerque?) and the later ones will stretch people who grew up here (who designed the flag, which spa town renamed itself for a radio show?), so it suits a classroom, a road trip down I-25, a family night or a bar quiz anywhere in the state. Every answer was checked against a reference encyclopaedia entry or the New Mexico Secretary of State's official symbols pages, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
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Q 01What is the capital of New Mexico?
Santa Fe
Founded in 1610, it is the oldest state capital in the country and, at about 7,000 feet, the highest.
Q 02New Mexico became a US state in which year?
1912
It was the 47th state, admitted on January 6, 1912, after 64 years as a territory.
Q 03New Mexico's official state question is what?
Red or green?
The legislature adopted it in 1996 to honor the chile industry; ordering both colors is called 'Christmas'.
Q 04Which bird is New Mexico's official state bird?
Greater roadrunner
The state bird appeared on a 1982 sheet of 20-cent US stamps showing all 50 state birds and flowers.
Q 05Which TV drama was set and filmed in Albuquerque?
Breaking Bad
Early scripts placed the story in Riverside, California; Sony suggested moving it for New Mexico's film incentives.
Q 06Which town became a UFO byword after debris was found nearby in 1947?
Roswell
The Air Force later concluded the debris came from a top-secret balloon program built to listen for Soviet nuclear tests.
Q 07What is New Mexico's official state nickname?
The Land of Enchantment
Writer Lillian Whiting used the phrase as a book title in 1906, but it only became the official nickname in 1999.
Q 08Albuquerque's famous October festival fills the sky with what?
Hot air balloons
It began in 1972 with just 13 balloons in a shopping-mall parking lot and now draws more than 500.
Q 09Which national park in southeastern New Mexico contains the largest cave chamber in North America?
Carlsbad Caverns
The Big Room is the largest cave chamber in North America and was first explored in 1898 by a teenager with a homemade wire ladder.
Q 10The dunes of White Sands National Park are made of which mineral?
Gypsum
It is the largest dunefield of its kind on Earth, holding roughly 4.5 billion tons of the crystal.
Q 11Which state flag features a red sun symbol on a yellow field?
New Mexico
Adopted in 1925, it is one of only four state flags without blue and the only one of those without white.
Q 12Which cartoon rabbit keeps taking a wrong turn at Albuquerque?
Bugs Bunny
The gag was introduced in the 1945 short Herr Meets Hare, when he ends up in the Black Forest instead of Las Vegas.
Q 13Which meeting point of New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona and Utah is a Navajo tribal park?
Four Corners
The monument there is run by the Navajo Nation as a tribal park, and it also marks a boundary with the Ute Mountain Ute reservation.
Q 21Which historic trade route linked Franklin, Missouri, to New Mexico's capital from 1821?
Santa Fe Trail
William Becknell pioneered it the year Mexico won independence, and it stayed busy until the railroad reached Santa Fe in 1880.
Q 22Which spa town renamed itself after a radio quiz show in 1950?
Hot Springs
Host Ralph Edwards promised to broadcast his 10th-anniversary show from the first town to take the program's name; it is now Truth or Consequences.
Q 23Which fictional Simpsons team gave Albuquerque's minor-league baseball club its name?
Isotopes
A 2001 episode had Homer go on hunger strike to stop the Springfield team moving to Albuquerque; the real club arrived from Calgary in 2003.
Q 14Which river runs north to south through the middle of New Mexico?
Rio Grande
At 1,896 miles it is the fourth-longest river in the United States and rises in Colorado's San Juan Mountains.
Q 15Which laboratory town was built for the Manhattan Project?
Los Alamos
The government took the site by eminent domain in 1943 from a private ranch school for boys.
Q 16On what date was the world's first nuclear weapon detonated at the Trinity site?
July 16, 1945
The blast melted the desert sand into a mildly radioactive light green glass that was named trinitite.
Q 17Which cookie is New Mexico's official state cookie, the first in the nation?
Biscochito
The anise-flavored treat was adopted in 1989 and is baked for weddings, baptisms and Christmas.
Q 18Which flower is New Mexico's official state flower?
Yucca
It was chosen in 1927 after a survey of the state's schoolchildren, backed by the Federation of Women's Clubs.
Q 19Which tree is the official state tree of New Mexico?
Piñon pine
Its edible nuts are a signature of New Mexican cooking, and Pueblo people could store them in pits for two or three years.
Q 20Along with chile, which food is one of New Mexico's two official state vegetables?
Frijoles
The pinto bean has been a staple of the Pueblo diet alongside corn and squash since prehistoric times.
Q 24Which painter, called the Mother of American modernism, lived at Ghost Ranch and Abiquiú?
Georgia O'Keeffe
She moved to New Mexico for good in 1949 and explored the landscape in a Ford Model A she learned to drive at 41.
Q 25Which uprising in 1680 drove the Spanish out of New Mexico for twelve years?
Pueblo Revolt
Leader Po'pay coordinated the villages with knotted cords: one knot untied per day, and the last knot was the signal to rise.
Q 26Which Albuquerque-born entrepreneur founded Amazon?
Jeff Bezos
He was born Jeffrey Preston Jorgensen in 1964 and was raised in Houston and Miami.
Q 27Which 'Take Me Home, Country Roads' singer-songwriter was born in New Mexico's UFO town in 1943?
John Denver
His father was an Army Air Forces pilot stationed at the local air field, and the family name was Deutschendorf.
Q 28Which Albuquerque-born actor grew up in Ruidoso and starred in How I Met Your Mother?
Neil Patrick Harris
He graduated with high honors from Albuquerque's La Cueva High School in 1991 despite spending half of each year on set.
Q 29Which state capitol building is round and nicknamed the Roundhouse?
New Mexico
Dedicated in 1966, it was designed to look like the Zia sun symbol from above, with four wings radiating from a cylinder.
Q 30Which village calls itself the Chile Capital of the World?
Hatch
It has hosted a chile festival every summer since 1971, and the tagline appears on one of the state's license plate designs.