State Fair Trivia
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47 free State Fair trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
50 free State fair trivia questions with answers. State fairs are where America goes to eat something on a stick, watch a 1,400-pound boar get weighed and argue about who really invented the corn dog. This quiz covers the whole midway: the first state fair in 1841, the giants in Texas, Iowa, Minnesota, Ohio and New York, the butter sculptures, the blue ribbons, the demolition derbies and the rides. You will find the origins of cotton candy and the Ferris wheel, what the four H's in 4-H stand for, which state runs two official state fairs, and how the county fair scene in Charlotte's Web actually ends. There is a stretch of easy crowd-pleasers, then the questions get harder for the people who have been to more than one Big Tex Choice Awards. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia, official fair websites or other primary sources before it went in, so you can play it at a fair-themed party or trivia night without worrying about a wrong answer sneaking through.
30 of 47 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which state held the first U.S. state fair, back in 1841?
New York
New York held the first U.S. state fair in 1841, a two-day show of speeches, animal exhibits and a plowing contest; for the next half-century it toured 11 cities before getting a permanent home.
Q 02The New York State Fair roamed for decades before settling in 1890 on the edge of which upstate city?
Syracuse
Syracuse won the fair for good in 1890, after a local land company donated a 100-acre tract in neighboring Geddes; rail lines crossing the site made hauling exhibits easy.
Q 03State fairs were originally created in the 1800s to promote what?
Agriculture
Agriculture was the purpose: early state fairs were competitive livestock shows and farm-product displays meant to spread better farming methods, and the rides, concerts and fried food came much later.
Q 04The State Fair of Texas, home of Big Tex, runs for 24 days each fall in which city?
Dallas
Dallas has owned the fairgrounds since 1904, when the struggling fair sold out to the city on condition that a stretch of every fall be set aside for the exposition.
Q 05As of 2025, which state fair draws the highest average daily attendance in the United States?
Minnesota
Minnesota packs about two million visitors into a twelve-day run at Falcon Heights ending on Labor Day, which gives it the highest daily average of any U.S. state fair.
Q 06Big Tex, the 55-foot cowboy who towers over the State Fair of Texas, booms which greeting at visitors?
Howdy, folks!
Howdy, folks! is Big Tex's line, though he stood silent at his 1952 debut: the fair added a voice and a swinging jaw a year later.
Q 07The figure that became Big Tex was built in 1949 to lure Christmas shoppers to Kerens, Texas, as a giant what?
A Santa Claus
A Santa Claus, 49 feet tall with a beard of unravelled rope, was the town's gimmick; when the novelty faded, the State Fair bought it for $750 in 1951 and rebuilt it as a cowboy.
Q 08What happened to the original Big Tex on October 19, 2012?
He was destroyed by a fire
He was destroyed by a fire that started in electrical wiring near his right boot and consumed the statue within minutes; a rebuilt Big Tex debuted in September 2013.
Q 09Fletcher's, a State Fair of Texas fixture for decades, is famous for which food?
Corny dogs
Corny dogs are the Fletcher family's claim to fame: brothers Carl and Neil Fletcher were selling the battered hot dogs at the fair by 1942, one of several rival claims to inventing the corn dog.
Q 10The Red River Rivalry, played each year at the Cotton Bowl during the State Fair, pits Texas against which school?
Oklahoma
Oklahoma has faced the Longhorns at the fairgrounds every year since 1929; the Cotton Bowl sits inside Fair Park, so fans walk past the midway and Big Tex on the way to their seats.
Q 11Which politician told a 1901 state fair crowd to "speak softly and carry a big stick"?
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt, then vice president, used the proverb in a state fair speech on September 2, 1901; four days later William McKinley was shot, and within two weeks Roosevelt was president.
Q 12Which creation won Most Creative at the State Fair of Texas Big Tex Choice Awards in 2010?
Fried beer
Fried beer won Most Creative in 2010: inventor Mark Zable sealed Guinness inside pretzel-style dough pockets and fried them so the beer stayed liquid inside.
Q 13Which state holds its state fair in Sedalia, Scott Joplin's ragtime town?
Missouri
Q 21Which state holds its state fair in Hutchinson rather than its capital or largest city?
Kansas
Kansas named Hutchinson's fair the official state fair in 1913, after Reno County voters overwhelmingly backed a bond issue to buy land and improve the fairgrounds.
Q 22What do Princess Kay of the Milky Way finalists do with their butter busts?
Take them home
Take them home: each finalist poses for hours in a rotating, glass-walled cooler while a 90-pound block of butter is carved into her likeness, then keeps the bust when the fair ends.
Q 23Sweet Martha's, a legendary state fair stand in Falcon Heights, sells what by the bucket?
Chocolate chip cookies
Missouri picked Sedalia in 1899, where the Van Riper family donated 150 acres for the grounds; the first fair opened there two years later.
Q 14What happens to the Iowa State Fair butter cow's butter after the fair?
Reused
Reused is the answer: about 600 pounds of butter are layered over a wood, metal and wire frame, and much of it is saved to sculpt the cow again for up to ten years.
Q 15The first Iowa State Fair, staged in Fairfield in 1854, was run on what budget?
$323
$323 was the entire budget, yet an estimated 7,000 to 10,000 people crowded onto a six-acre fairground in Fairfield for the three-day event.
Q 16Which newspaper runs the Iowa State Fair's Political Soapbox for presidential hopefuls?
The Des Moines Register
The Des Moines Register gives each speaker 20 minutes on its Soapbox stage; candidates come because Iowa's caucuses have historically opened the presidential race.
Q 17Iowa's Butter Cow Lady, Norma 'Duffy' Lyon, also carved a butter version of which artwork?
The Last Supper
The Last Supper, done in butter in 1999, was among her boldest pieces; after more than four decades at the fair she handed the butter cow to her longtime apprentice, Sarah Pratt.
Q 18In the 1932 novel State Fair, what kind of animal is the Frakes' prize entry Blue Boy?
A hog
A hog: Abel Frake bets the local storekeeper five dollars that his Hampshire boar Blue Boy will be grand champion, and comes home from the fair to collect.
Q 19Which song from the 1945 musical film State Fair won the Academy Award for Best Original Song?
It Might as Well Be Spring
It Might as Well Be Spring won Rodgers and Hammerstein the 1945 Academy Award; Jeanne Crain's Margy sings it (dubbed by Louanne Hogan) while moping around the farm before the fair.
Q 20Who played farmer Abel Frake in the original 1933 film version of State Fair?
Will Rogers
Will Rogers played Abel Frake, with Janet Gaynor as his daughter Margy; in 1935, censors had a bedroom scene cut before the studio could reissue the film.
Chocolate chip cookies are Sweet Martha's whole menu: baked fresh all day and sold in cones or overflowing buckets, they made the stand the fair's highest-grossing vendor for years.
Q 24The New York State Fair's Dairy Products Building has a bar that pours 25-cent cups of what?
Milk
Milk, white or chocolate, is what the fair's Milk Bar pours; when the fair closes, the butter from the 800-pound sculpture nearby is converted into energy.
Q 25What pastry, sold since 1924, is the Wisconsin State Fair's most popular food?
Cream puffs
Cream puffs have been the fair's signature since 1924; the Wisconsin Bakers Association bakes hundreds of thousands each fair and marked the treat's 100th anniversary in 2024.
Q 26Which state's fair first displayed a butter cow in 1903, eight years before the Iowa State Fair did?
Ohio
Ohio's 1903 fair displayed a butter cow and calf sculpted for A.T. Shelton & Company, distributors of Sunbury creamery butter; the cow became an annual tradition, joined by a new companion sculpture each year.
Q 27The first Ohio State Fair, in 1850, was held away from Columbus in which city, then the state's largest?
Cincinnati
Cincinnati's Camp Washington hosted the 1850 fair after a cholera outbreak forced the planned 1849 event to be postponed; the fair then rotated among cities before settling in Columbus in 1874.
Q 28Raleigh's saddle-shaped Dorton Arena, opened in 1952, was the first building in the world to use what?
A cable-supported roof
A cable-supported roof hangs between two crossed concrete arches at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds; architect Matthew Nowicki died in a plane crash before building began, and a colleague finished his design.
Q 29Which California attraction opened its monorail in 1959, nine years before Cal Expo built its own?
Disneyland
Disneyland opened its monorail in June 1959, when the ceremonial scissors failed and Walt Disney tore the ribbon by hand; Cal Expo built its own line in 1968, the year the state fair moved to that Sacramento site.
Q 30Scott Robb set a world record at the 2012 Alaska State Fair with a 138-pound specimen of which vegetable?
Cabbage
Cabbage it was, at 138.25 pounds; the Matanuska-Susitna Valley's long summer daylight is why the Palmer fair is famous for absurdly large vegetables.