Which company ran the first line?

Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT)

What was the 1870 Beach Pneumatic Transit?

A one-block air-pushed tunnel car

New York Subway History Quiz: 1904 Opening and IRT Lines

This New York subway history quiz rides back to opening day in October 1904, when the first IRT trains left City Hall. Play 10 interactive questions on the pneumatic tube that came first, cut-and-cover digging, the mayor at the controls, the closed City Hall station, rival companies, tokens, MetroCards and 24-hour service.

Start New York Subway History Quiz

🎯 Daily Trivia Challenge • 🧠 10 Questions • ⏱️ 150 Seconds

Question 1 / 10 Time: 150s

Open
When did New York's first subway line open?
Company
Which company ran the first line?
Start
From which station did the first line start?
Mayor
Who drove the first train for part of the trip?
Beach
What was the 1870 Beach Pneumatic Transit?
Method
How were many early tunnels built?
Closed
Which beautiful station closed in 1945?
Rivals
Which other systems later joined the IRT?
Token
When were subway tokens introduced?
Hours
What is unusual about the subway's hours?

Explanations: answer key for all 10 questions

Q1: When did New York's first subway line open?
Answer: October 1904
Crowds lined up to ride.
Q2: Which company ran the first line?
Answer: Interborough Rapid Transit (IRT)
The city built the tunnels.
Q3: From which station did the first line start?
Answer: City Hall
It ran up to 145th Street.
Q4: Who drove the first train for part of the trip?
Answer: Mayor George McClellan
He took the controls himself.
Q5: What was the 1870 Beach Pneumatic Transit?
Answer: A one-block air-pushed tunnel car
Alfred Ely Beach built it.
Q6: How were many early tunnels built?
Answer: Cut and cover
Streets were dug up and covered.
Q7: Which beautiful station closed in 1945?
Answer: City Hall station
Its curved platform was too short.
Q8: Which other systems later joined the IRT?
Answer: BMT and IND
The city unified them in 1940.
Q9: When were subway tokens introduced?
Answer: 1953
MetroCards came in 1994.
Q10: What is unusual about the subway's hours?
Answer: It runs 24 hours a day
Few big systems do this.

New York Subway History Quiz – 1904 Opening and IRT Lines

New York's first subway line opened on 27 October 1904, run by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company. Trains ran from City Hall up to 145th Street, and Mayor George McClellan drove the first train for part of the way.

Decades earlier, Alfred Ely Beach had built a one-block pneumatic tube under Broadway. The IRT tunnels were mostly built by cut and cover, digging up streets and roofing them over.

The BMT and the city-owned IND later added lines, and the city unified the systems in 1940. The ornate City Hall station closed in 1945, tokens arrived in 1953 and MetroCards in 1994, and the subway still runs 24 hours a day.

What This Quiz Teaches

History fans will enjoy these questions.

When it opened
Who ran it
How tunnels were built
Which stations closed
How fares changed

Did You Know?

City Hall station has Guastavino tile arches.
Riders on the 6 train can glimpse it on the loop.
The OMNY tap system arrived in 2019.
The system has hundreds of stations.
Many stations have mosaic name tablets.