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70 free St. Louis trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
66 free St. Louis trivia questions with answers. St. Louis is a city that keeps turning up in other people's stories: the fair that gave America the ice cream cone, the Olympics with the wooden-legged gymnast, the ballpark where a 3-foot-7 pinch hitter drew a walk, the bar where Chuck Berry played once a month into his eighties. This St. Louis trivia quiz gathers all of it in one place. The questions cover the founding and the Arch, the 1904 World's Fair and Olympics, the Cardinals, Blues and Rams, the food (toasted ravioli, gooey butter cake, Provel, concretes), Anheuser-Busch and the Clydesdales, Forest Park and its free institutions, the neighborhoods, the architecture and the famous natives. Roughly a third are easy warm-ups, a third are for people who have lived here a while, and the rest are for the friend who insists on explaining the Great Divorce at parties. Every answer has been checked against a real source and each question shows where it came from, so you can settle the argument with the evidence rather than a listicle. Use it for a trivia night, a road-trip warm-up, or a solo test of how well you know the Gateway City.
30 of 70 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The city was founded in 1764 by French fur traders and named after which French monarch?
The crusader Louis IX
Louis IX was the crusader-king canonised as Saint Louis in 1297, which is why the city gets a saint's name rather than a plain royal one.
Q 02Which two French fur traders are usually credited with founding the city, along with Gilbert de St. Maxent?
Pierre Laclède and Auguste Chouteau
Chouteau was only about 14 when he led the work party that started clearing the site; Laclède was his stepfather in all but name.
Q 03How tall is the Gateway Arch?
630 feet
It is exactly as wide at the base as it is tall, and it was designed to sway up to 18 inches in high wind.
Q 04Which Finnish-American architect designed the Gateway Arch?
Eero Saarinen
The competition jury picked his entry unanimously in February 1948; his father Eliel, also an entrant, was reportedly congratulated by mistake at first.
Q 05In what year was construction of the Gateway Arch completed?
1965
Building started in February 1963 and the last piece went in on October 28, 1965; the public did not ride to the top until June 1967.
Q 06The Gateway Arch is clad in which material?
Stainless steel
The skin is quarter-inch grade 304 stainless steel, which is why the monument shifts colour with the sky and never needed painting.
Q 07What geometric shape does the Gateway Arch take?
A weighted catenary
A catenary is the curve a hanging chain makes; flip it and it stands entirely in compression, which is why the arch needs no internal frame.
Q 08Roughly how much did the Gateway Arch cost to build?
$13 million
That is close to $100 million in today's money, still a bargain for the tallest arch on Earth.
Q 09Which world's fair did St. Louis host in 1904?
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition
It marked 100 years since the purchase (a year late), sprawled over 1,270 acres and drew nearly 19.7 million people.
Q 10Which food is most famously said to have been popularised at the 1904 St. Louis fair?
The ice cream cone
Historians stress popularised, not invented: the waffle-style cone existed already, but the fair is where America met it.
Q 11Which soft drink was introduced to a national audience at the 1904 fair?
Dr Pepper
Puffed Wheat cereal made its national debut at the same fair, shot from cannons as a crowd-pulling stunt.
Q 12The 1904 fair's Palace of Fine Arts, designed by Cass Gilbert, survives today as what?
The Saint Louis Art Museum
Almost everything else at the fair was temporary plaster; the art palace was built in stone precisely so it could outlast the party.
Q 13The giant organ built for the 1904 fair's Festival Hall ended up in which city's department store?
Philadelphia
John Wanamaker bought it, tripled its size, and it is still played daily as the Wanamaker Organ in what is now a Macy's.
Q 21The Cardinals' famous 'birds on the bat' logo first appeared in what year?
1922
The club had only adopted the name Cardinals in 1900, having played its first years as the Brown Stockings and then the Browns.
Q 22Which nickname was given to the rowdy Cardinals team that won the 1934 World Series?
The Gashouse Gang
Ozzie Smith, decades later, would give the club its next signature image with backflips and a record 13 Gold Gloves at shortstop.
Q 23What is the seating capacity of the current Busch Stadium, opened in 2006?
44,383
It is the third ballpark to carry the Busch name and hosted the 2009 All-Star Game.
Q 14The 1904 Olympics in St. Louis were the first Games held where?
Outside Europe
Chicago had originally won the Games, but they were moved to coincide with the fair, and most competitors turned out to be American.
Q 15Which medal format debuted at the 1904 St. Louis Olympics?
Gold, silver and bronze for the top three
Earlier Games had handed out silver to winners and bronze to runners-up; St. Louis set the podium everyone knows.
Q 16American gymnast George Eyser won six medals at the 1904 Games despite what?
Having a wooden left leg
He lost the leg after being run over by a train, and still took gold on the parallel bars, vault and rope climb.
Q 17The 1904 Olympic marathon winner Thomas Hicks was helped along by his handlers with what?
Strychnine and brandy
The first man across the line, Fred Lorz, was disqualified for riding part of the course in a car, and only 14 of 32 starters finished.
Q 18Cuban runner Andarín Carvajal finished fourth in the 1904 marathon despite doing what mid-race?
Napping after eating spoiled apples
Another runner, Len Taunyane, was chased about a mile off course by a dog and still finished ninth.
Q 19How many World Series titles have the St. Louis Cardinals won?
11
That is the most in the National League and second overall only to the Yankees.
Q 20Which Cardinals pitcher posted a modern-record 1.12 ERA in 1968?
Bob Gibson
His season was so dominant that baseball lowered the pitcher's mound the following year.
Q 24The St. Louis Blues hockey team is named after a song by which composer?
W. C. Handy
The Blues joined the NHL in the 1967 expansion and lost their first three Stanley Cup Finals in a row.
Q 25In what year did the Blues finally win their first Stanley Cup?
2019
They beat Boston in Game 7 after sitting dead last in the league on January 3 that season.
Q 26Which 1980s pop song became the Blues' unofficial victory anthem during their 2019 Cup run?
'Gloria' by Laura Branigan
Players heard it in a Philadelphia bar after a road win and adopted it for every home victory that followed.
Q 27Which NFL team won Super Bowl XXXIV while based in St. Louis?
The Rams
Linebacker Mike Jones stopped Tennessee's Kevin Dyson just short of the goal line on the final play, a moment known simply as 'The Tackle'.
Q 28The Rams left St. Louis to return to Los Angeles after which season?
2015
In 2021 the NFL and owner Stan Kroenke paid the city $790 million to settle the lawsuit over the move.
Q 29The Hill's signature appetizer, 'toasted' in name only, is actually prepared how?
Breaded and deep-fried
Legend says a chef on The Hill dropped a ravioli into the fryer by accident in the 1940s, and 'toasted' just sounded nicer than 'fried'; it comes with marinara for dipping.
Q 30A famous sticky St. Louis cake is said to have been born in the 1930s when a baker made what mistake?
Swapped the amounts of two main ingredients
He reversed the proportions of butter and flour, producing the dense, sweet slab now called gooey butter cake, which the city has refused to give up ever since.