Daniel Boone: Early Years

Born: October 22 (November 2 new style), 1734
Died: September 26, 1820 (age 85)

He was an American pioneer and hunter whose frontier exploits made him one of the first folk heroes of the United States. Boone is most famous for his exploration and settlement of what is now the U.S. state of Kentucky, which was then beyond the western borders of the Thirteen Colonies.

What do you know about Daniel Boone? Try this U.S. History Made Easy Biography Trivia quiz. You'll find the answers at the bottom of the page.

1) In 1731, the Boones built a log cabin. The location is now the Daniel Boone Homestead in Berks County, Pennsylvanian. It is where Daniel was born. What is the location known as?

• Oley Valley
• Heaven's Gate
• Boone Town

2) Daniel Boone grew up as a Quaker?

• True or False?

3) In 1750 Squire Boone sold his land and moved the family. Where did they move to

• North Carolina
• Western Virginia
• Kentucky

4) Many historians caution that the folk image of Boone as semiliterate is misleading, however, arguing that Boone "acquired a level of literacy that was the equal of most men of his times." Boone regularly took reading material with him on his hunting expeditions, the Bible and Gulliver's Travels were favorites, and he was often the only literate person in groups of frontiersmen. Boone would sometimes entertain his hunting companions by reading to them around the evening campfire.

• True or False?

5) As a young man, Boone served with the British military during the French and Indian War (1754–1763), a struggle for control of the land beyond the Appalachian Mountains. In 1755, he was a wagon driver in General Edward Braddock's attempt to drive the French out of the Ohio Country, which ended in disaster at the Battle of the Monongahela. On August 14, 1756, who did he marry?

• Roberta Cummings
• Rebecca Bryan
• Agnes Moorehead

6) On May 1, 1769, Boone began a hunting expedition into Kentucky. When did he return home?

• 1769
• 1770
• 1771

7) On September 25, 1773, Boone packed up his family and, with a group of about 50 emigrants, began the first attempt by British colonists to establish a settlement in Kentucky. Boone's sone and William Russell's son Henry were captured and gruesomely tortured to death. The brutality of the killings sent shock waves along the frontier, and Boone's party abandoned its expedition. Which son of Daniel Boone was captured and died?

• James
• Martin
• William

8) Richard Henderson hired Boone to blaze a trail which went through the Cumberland Gap and into central Kentucky. What was the trail known as?

• Highland Trail
• Wilderness Road
• Boones Road

9) When did Daniel and his family settle in Boonesborough?

• July 8, 1775
• September 8, 1775
• December 8, 1775

10) On July 14, 1776, Boone's daughter Jemima, Betsey and Fanny Callaway were captured outside Boonesborough by an Indian war party, who carried the girls north towards the Shawnee towns in the Ohio country. Boone and a group of men from Boonesborough followed in pursuit, finally catching up with them two days later. Boone and his men ambushed the Indians while they were stopped for a meal, rescuing the girls and driving off their captors. The incident became the most celebrated event of Boone's life.

• True or False?