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70 free Princeton University trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Princeton University trivia quiz covers the fourth-oldest college in America from its 1746 charter as the College of New Jersey, through the Battle of Princeton and the four months Nassau Hall served as the nation's capital, to the modern research university with the largest endowment per student in the country. You will find questions on the presidents who shaped it (Witherspoon, McCosh, Woodrow Wilson, Shirley Tilghman), the campus (Nassau Hall's bronze tigers, the buried Big Cannon, Lake Carnegie, the University Chapel, Firestone Library), student life (eating clubs and bicker, the Honor Code, the FitzRandolph Gates, Newman's Day, Reunions and the P-rade), athletics (the first intercollegiate football game against Rutgers, Dick Kazmaier's Heisman, Pete Carril and the Princeton offense, Bill Bradley) and the alumni and faculty, from James Madison and F. Scott Fitzgerald to Michelle Obama, Jeff Bezos, Toni Morrison and Einstein at the Institute for Advanced Study next door. Some questions are easy for anyone who has walked Nassau Street; others will test alumni who remember every arch sing. Every answer has been checked against primary sources, chiefly the Wikipedia articles on the university, its buildings and its teams, and each explanation adds one more detail. Play, see your score, and share it with the Tigers in your life.
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Q 01Under what name was Princeton founded in 1746?
College of New Jersey
It became a university and took the name Princeton in 1896, 150 years after its charter.
Q 02In which New Jersey town did the college first open, in Jonathan Dickinson's parsonage?
Elizabeth
It moved to Newark in 1747 after Dickinson died and finally to Princeton in 1756.
Q 03Princeton is the fourth-oldest US college. How many colonial colleges were chartered before the Revolution?
Nine
Only Harvard, William & Mary and Yale are older.
Q 04Why did the college leave its second home for Princeton in 1756?
It was felt to be too close to New York
Governor Jonathan Belcher, who had 'adopted' the infant college, strongly recommended the central New Jersey site.
Q 05Nassau Hall is named for which monarch?
William III of England
Trustees wanted to name it for Governor Belcher, but he vetoed the idea and it honored the House of Orange-Nassau instead.
Q 06Which Princeton president, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, led the college 1768–1794?
John Witherspoon
He tightened standards and steered the college toward producing leaders for the new nation.
Q 07For how long in 1783 did Princeton serve as the capital of the United States?
Four months
The Continental Congress met in Nassau Hall and learned there of the peace treaty with Britain.
Q 08A cannonball at the Battle of Princeton reportedly 'decapitated' a Nassau Hall portrait of which king?
George II
The gun was said to belong to Alexander Hamilton's artillery company; Princeton had rejected Hamilton when he first arrived in the colonies.
Q 09On what date was the Battle of Princeton fought?
January 3, 1777
It followed Washington's surprise attack at Trenton a week earlier.
Q 10Which former president led the creation of Princeton's alumni association in the 1820s?
James Madison
The association began raising funds when President Carnahan was considering closing the struggling college.
Q 11Which president's tenure (1868–88) saw the Triangle Club, Glee Club and first eating club founded?
James McCosh
He also lifted the college out of its post-Civil War slump and abolished fraternities and sororities.
Q 12In what year did the college officially become a university and take the Princeton name?
1896
The Graduate School followed in 1900, and the honor system had been established in 1893.
Q 13Which future US president served as Princeton's 13th president from 1902?
Woodrow Wilson
He introduced the preceptorial system of small-group teaching in 1905 and lost his fight over where to put the Graduate College.
Q 21Since 1911 the front entrance of Nassau Hall has been flanked by two bronze what?
Tigers
They were a gift of the Class of 1879 and replaced two lions given in 1889.
Q 22The 'Big Cannon' buried in Cannon Green was left behind by which army?
The British after the Battle of Princeton
Students dragged it onto campus under cover of night in 1838 and buried it in 1840.
Q 23Students from which neighboring university stole Princeton's Little Cannon in 1875?
Rutgers
Their successors still occasionally paint the protruding cannons scarlet.
Q 14What teaching innovation did Princeton's 13th president introduce in 1905?
The preceptorial system
Small groups called precepts met with a preceptor to supplement lectures, a then-unique idea in the US.
Q 15Andrew Carnegie funded Lake Carnegie in 1906 hoping students would row instead of playing which sport?
Football
The Shea Rowing Center on the lake still houses Princeton rowing.
Q 16Princeton's Graduate College sits half a mile from campus because Dean West beat whom in a dispute?
Woodrow Wilson
Its Cleveland Tower is a memorial to Grover Cleveland and holds a 67-bell carillon.
Q 17The tower crowning the Graduate College is a memorial to which former Princeton trustee and US president?
Grover Cleveland
Its carillon of 67 bells is one of the largest in the world.
Q 18Abraham Flexner created the Institute for Advanced Study in 1930 with money from which philanthropists?
Louis Bamberger and Caroline Bamberger Fuld
Einstein, Gödel, von Neumann and Oppenheimer all worked there; it is separate from the university but closely tied to it.
Q 19Which supervising architect enforced Princeton's Collegiate Gothic style until 1960 and designed its University Chapel?
Ralph Adams Cram
When it opened in 1928 the chapel was the second-largest university chapel in the world after King's College, Cambridge.
Q 20Who designed Princeton's grounds between 1912 and 1943?
Beatrix Farrand
A campus courtyard was recently named in her honor.
Q 24Princeton played in the first intercollegiate gridiron game on November 6, 1869. What was the result?
Rutgers won 6–4
Princeton won the rematch a week later 8–0, and it played under rugby rules from 1877 until at least 1903.
Q 25Which Princeton back won the 1951 Heisman Trophy, the last ever awarded to an Ivy Leaguer?
Dick Kazmaier
The Tigers had won their final national championship the year before, when he was a junior.
Q 26Which coach led Princeton men's basketball from 1967 to 1996 and devised the 'Princeton offense'?
Pete Carril
His final win was the 1996 NCAA tournament upset of defending champion UCLA.
Q 27Which future US senator was named Most Outstanding Player when Princeton reached the 1965 Final Four?
Bill Bradley
The Tigers play their home games at Jadwin Gymnasium.
Q 28What are Princeton's colors?
Orange and black
A 2007 effort to give the tiger mascot a name was dropped after alumni and student opposition.
Q 29Coach Fritz Crisler carried Princeton's helmet design to which school, where it became the famous winged helmet?
Michigan
Crisler coached at Princeton before Michigan hired him.
Q 30Princeton's men's lacrosse team won how many national championships between 1992 and 2001?
Six
In 2012 the field hockey team became the first in the Ivy League to win a national title.