Statue of Liberty Trivia Quiz Questions With Answers

Trivia quiz questions with answers about the Statue of Liberty.

Statue of Liberty Trivia Quiz Questions With Answers

What is the Statue of Liberty?
A: The Statue of Liberty is a colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor in New York City, in the United States.

The copper statue was a gift from whom?
A: The people of France to the people of the United States.

Who designed it?
A: It was designed by French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi and built by Gustave Eiffel.

When was the statue dedicated?
A: On October 28, 1886.

The Statue of Liberty is a figure of whom?
A: Libertas, a robed Roman liberty goddess.

What does she hold above her head with her right hand?
A: A torch.

What does she carry in her left hand?
A: A tabula ansata inscribed in Roman numerals with "JULY IV MDCCLXXVI" (July 4, 1776), the date of the U.S. Declaration of Independence.

What lies at her feet as she walks forward?
A: A broken chain.

According to the National Park Service, the idea for the Statue of Liberty was first proposed by whom?
A: Édouard René de Laboulaye, president of the French Anti-Slavery Society and a prominent and important political thinker of his time.

The project is traced to a mid-1865 conversation between de Laboulaye, a staunch abolitionist, and whom?
A: Frédéric Bartholdi, a sculptor.

Any large project was further delayed by what war?
A: The Franco-Prussian War, in which Bartholdi served as a major of militia.

In the war, Napoleon III was what?
A: Captured and deposed.

Bartholdi had been planning a trip to the United States, he and Laboulaye decided the time was right to do what?
A: To discuss the idea with influential Americans.

Arriving at New York Harbor, Bartholdi focused on Bedloe's Island (now named Liberty Island) as a site for the statue, struck by what?
A: The fact that vessels arriving in New York had to sail past it.

He was delighted to learn that the island was owned by whom?
A: The United States government.

As well as meeting many influential New Yorkers, Bartholdi visited what US President?
A: President Ulysses S. Grant, who assured him that it would not be difficult to obtain the site for the statue.

When did Bartholdi make the first model of his concept?
A: In 1870.

Bartholdi and Laboulaye considered how best to express the idea of American what?
A: Liberty.

Bartholdi's early models were all similar in concept: a female figure in neoclassical style representing liberty, wearing what?
A: A stola and pella (gown and cloak, common in depictions of Roman goddesses) and holding a torch aloft.

Bartholdi considered having Liberty hold a broken chain, but decided this would be what?
A: Too divisive in the days after the Civil War.

The erected statue does stride over a broken chain, half-hidden by her what?
A: Her robes and it’s difficult to see from the ground.

Bartholdi was initially uncertain of what to place in Liberty's what?
A: Her left hand.

He settled on a tabula ansata, used to evoke what?
A: The concept of law.

What is inscribed on her tablet?
A: "JULY IV MDCCLXXVI", thus associating the date of the country's Declaration of Independence with the concept of liberty.

In September 1875, what did Bartholdi announce?
A: The project and the formation of the Franco-American Union as its fundraising arm.

With the announcement, the statue was given what name?
A: Liberty Enlightening the World.

The French would finance the statue; Americans would be expected to pay for what?
A: The pedestal.

Although plans for the statue had not been finalized, Bartholdi moved forward with fabrication of what?
A: The right arm, bearing the torch, and the head.

Where were committees to raise money to pay for the foundation and pedestal formed?
A: In New York, Boston, and Philadelphia.

The New York group eventually took on most of the responsibility for American fundraising and is often referred to as what?
A: The "American Committee".

One of its members was 19-year-old Theodore Roosevelt, the future what?
A: Governor of New York and president of the United States.

On March 3, 1877, on his final full day in office, President Grant signed a joint resolution that authorized what?
A: It authorized the President to accept the statue when it was presented by France and to select a site for it.

President Rutherford B. Hayes, who took office the following day, selected what site?
A: The Bedloe's Island site that Bartholdi had proposed.

Bartholdi was able to obtain the services of what innovative designer and builder?
A: Gustave Eiffel.

Eiffel's design made the statue one of the earliest examples of what type of construction?
A: Curtain wall construction, in which the exterior of the structure is not load bearing, but is instead supported by an interior framework.

Why did he include two interior spiral staircases?
A: To make it easier for visitors to reach the observation point in the crown.

Access to an observation platform surrounding the torch was also provided, but the narrowness of the arm allowed for what?
A: A single ladder, 40 feet (12 m) long.

He had originally expected to assemble the skin on-site as the masonry pier was built; instead he decided to build the statue in France and have it what?
A: Disassembled and transported to the United States for reassembly in place on Bedloe's Island.

In a symbolic act, the first rivet placed into the skin, fixing a copper plate onto the statue's big toe, was driven by whom?
A: United States Ambassador to France Levi P. Morton.

By 1882, the statue was complete up to what?
A: The waist.

The completed statue was formally presented to Ambassador Morton at a ceremony in Paris on what date?
A: July 4, 1884.

The statue remained intact in Paris pending sufficient progress on what?
A: The pedestal.

By January 1885, the pedestal was far enough along and the statue was what?
A: Disassembled and crated for its ocean voyage.

The foundation of Bartholdi's statue was to be laid where?
A: Inside Fort Wood, a disused army base on Bedloe's Island constructed between 1807 and 1811.

The fortifications of the structure were in the shape of what?
A: An eleven-point star.

The statue's foundation and pedestal were aligned so that it would face which direction?
A: Southeast, greeting ships entering the harbor from the Atlantic Ocean.

Bartholdi placed what near the top of the pedestal?
A: An observation platform, above which the statue itself rises.

Construction on the 15-foot-deep (4.6 m) foundation began in 1883, and when was the pedestal's cornerstone laid?
A: In 1884.

On June 17, 1885, the French steamer Isère, arrived in New York with the crates holding what?
A: The disassembled statue on board.

How many people lined the docks?
A: Two hundred thousand, and hundreds of boats put to sea to welcome the ship.

Eiffel's iron framework was anchored to what?
A: Steel I-beams within the concrete pedestal and assembled.

Once this was done, the sections of skin were what?
A: Carefully attached.

Due to the width of the pedestal, it was not possible to erect scaffolding and workers did what?
A: Dangled from ropes while installing the skin sections.

When was the ceremony of dedication held?
A: On the afternoon of October 28, 1886.

Who presided over the event?
A: President Grover Cleveland, the former New York governor

On the morning of the dedication what was held in New York City?
A: A parade.

Estimates of the number of people who watched it ranged from several hundred thousand to what?
A: A million.