On this day: August 2
POSTED: 01:10 PM PDT Aug 01, 2012
UPDATED: 11:00 PM PDT Aug 01, 2012
America formally declares its independence, the U.S. Census is born, a president dies, JFK becomes a hero and a young Robert Zimmerman changes his name, all on this day.
Library of Congress
1923: President Warren G. Harding (left), who had been suffering from a respiratory illness believed to be pneumonia, shudders and drops dead in the middle of a conversation with his wife at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco. Physicians attending to him point to congestive heart failure as the cause of death. Vice President Calvin Coolidge (right) is sworn in as the 30th U.S. president.
