170 Fun Facts About 4th of July

Whom did the Committee of Five pick to draft the Declaration of Independence?

Thomas Jefferson later said the rest of the Committee of Five 'unanimously pressed' him to write it alone; his colleagues changed little, but Congress spent two days cutting and rewording his text.

Which colony reversed its position and voted for independence on 2 July 1776?

South Carolina's delegates, led by Edward Rutledge, reversed their July 1 no vote on July 2, 1776, giving the independence resolution twelve colonies in favor.

Who gave the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia on 8 July 1776?

John Nixon, a Philadelphia militia officer, read it at noon in the State House yard while Trenton and Easton held readings too; the famous bell probably rang that day, though no account from the time says so.

How did Washington mark July 4, 1778, at his New Jersey headquarters?

A double rum ration for the troops came with thirteen cannon and a feu de joie beside the Raritan; Washington's orders also told the soldiers to adorn their hats with green boughs.

Which president issued a 1916 order honoring 'The Star-Spangled Banner' before Congress acted?

Woodrow Wilson's 1916 order came 15 years before the 1931 law that made the song the national anthem; opponents of that bill had argued the tune was too hard for most people to sing.

Which word completes the Declaration's famous line 'We hold these truths to be…'?

Self-evident was a late edit: the rough draft called the truths 'sacred and undeniable' before the drafting committee revised the line.

Which colony became the first to renounce its allegiance to the British Crown, on 4 May 1776?

Rhode Island renounced its allegiance two months before Congress declared independence, yet in 1790 it became the last of the thirteen states to ratify the Constitution.

Benjamin Rush recalled signers filing up in 'pensive and awful silence', believing the Declaration was their own what?

Death warrant was Rush's phrase in an 1811 letter; he added that the hefty Benjamin Harrison broke the gloom by joking that he would hang faster than a lighter colleague.

In which two towns did the opening battles of the American Revolutionary War take place in April 1775?

Lexington and Concord: British regulars sent to destroy militia stores met minutemen roused overnight by Paul Revere and other riders, and their march back to Boston became a rout.

Which NASA mission landed on Mars on July 4, 1997, delivering the first rover to the planet?

Mars Pathfinder touched down in Ares Vallis on Independence Day 1997 and set loose Sojourner, the first rover on Mars, proving a new way to land there safely.

Which founding father envisioned independence celebrated with "bonfires and illuminations"?

John Adams told his wife on 3 July 1776 that independence should be marked with 'Pomp and Parade… Bonfires and Illuminations', though he expected 2 July, the day of the vote, to be the anniversary.

How many stars were on the first official American flag, established by the Flag Act of 1777?

13 stars, one per state, formed what the 1777 resolution called 'a new constellation'; stars and stripes both rose to 15 when Vermont and Kentucky joined, before Congress fixed the stripes at 13 again.

Which two presidents, both Declaration signers, died on the same Fourth of July?

John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died hours apart on July 4, 1826, the Declaration's 50th anniversary; Adams's last words were reportedly 'Thomas Jefferson survives', yet his old rival had died first.

Which day joined January 1, July 4 and Thanksgiving as the first federal holidays in 1870?

Christmas Day completed the first four federal holidays in 1870, but the law reached no further than Washington, D.C.: at first they were days off for federal workers in that one city, not the whole country.

Which Virginia delegate proposed the independence resolution in Congress on June 7, 1776?

Richard Henry Lee's resolution called the colonies 'free and independent States'; Congress put off the vote for three weeks, named a committee to draft a declaration in the meantime, and passed it on July 2.

Which colony's delegate Caesar Rodney rode through the night to cast its vote for independence?

Delaware: Caesar Rodney rode overnight from Dover through a storm to reach Philadelphia on July 2, 1776, breaking the tie between Thomas McKean and George Read so Delaware voted yes.

Who was the first person to sign the Declaration of Independence?

His flamboyant signature made 'John Hancock' American slang for a signature. The tale that he wanted King George to read it without spectacles is apocryphal.

Which state was the first to make July 4th an official state celebration, in 1781?

Massachusetts made the Fourth official in 1781, before independence was even secure: the Revolutionary War did not formally end for another two years.

Which body adopted the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia on July 4, 1776?

The Second Continental Congress adopted it on July 4, 1776, two days after actually voting for independence on July 2.

Who gave the 1852 speech asking 'What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July'?

Frederick Douglass spoke on July 5, 1852, to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society at Corinthian Hall, telling his audience that to the enslaved 'your celebration is a sham'.

Which president presided over the Bicentennial celebrations on July 4, 1976?

Gerald Ford had been president only since August 1974, when Richard Nixon resigned over Watergate, so it fell to him to lead the nation's 200th-birthday celebrations.

Which European country allied officially with the United States in 1778 and helped fight the Revolutionary War?

France signed the alliance in Paris on 6 February 1778, and its troops and fleet proved crucial three years later in forcing the British surrender at Yorktown.

The long middle section of the Declaration of Independence lists 27 what?

Grievances against the king, from dissolving legislatures to 'imposing Taxes on us without our Consent', were the Declaration's proof that the colonies had the right to rebel.

During which war was the Declaration parchment hidden at Fort Knox for safekeeping?

World War II: after Pearl Harbor the Declaration and Constitution were moved from the Library of Congress to the Fort Knox Bullion Depository in December 1941, returning to Washington in 1944.

What military event on the night of December 25–26, 1776, boosted American Revolutionary morale?

Crossing of the Delaware on Christmas night 1776 let the Continental Army surprise the Hessian garrison at Trenton the next morning and capture most of it, at a cost of only a handful of casualties.

The bombardment of which fort in 1814 inspired 'The Star-Spangled Banner'?

Fort McHenry in Baltimore harbor held out under British bombardment through the night of September 13-14, 1814; Francis Scott Key, watching from a ship, saw its flag still flying at dawn and wrote the poem.

The Declaration of Independence opens 'When in the Course of' what?

Human events: the opening sentence says 'a decent respect to the opinions of mankind' requires a people to declare the causes of their separation, and the rest of the text sets them out.

Which 1783 treaty ended the Revolutionary War and recognized American independence?

The Treaty of Paris, signed on September 3, 1783, gave the new nation the land east of the Mississippi River; Benjamin West's painting of the signing stayed unfinished because the British delegates would not pose.

What adjective does the Declaration of Independence use for the rights to 'Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness'?

Unalienable is the word in the final Declaration, even though the handwritten rough draft read 'inalienable'; both forms mean rights that cannot be taken away or handed over.

Which influential pamphlet, published in 1776, strongly advocated for American independence?

Common Sense, Thomas Paine's 47-page pamphlet of January 1776, attacked monarchy itself in plain language meant for ordinary readers, and it became an immediate sensation.

In Charles Thomson's explanation of the Great Seal, what does red, a color shared with the flag, signify?

Hardiness and valor is red's meaning in Thomson's report, with white for purity and innocence and blue for vigilance, perseverance and justice; the 1777 flag resolution itself gave the colors no meaning.

Which novelist of Puritan New England, a witch-trial judge's descendant, was born on July 4, 1804?

Nathaniel Hawthorne, born on July 4, 1804, set The Scarlet Letter among his Puritan forebears; he probably added the 'w' to his surname to distance himself from the judge, John Hathorne.

Which nickname did sea captain William Driver give the U.S. flag he flew on his voyages?

Old Glory: William Driver named the big flag he flew at sea, later kept it out of Confederate hands in Nashville during the Civil War, and it now belongs to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History.

Which Pennsylvania financier skipped the 2 July 1776 vote yet signed the Declaration in August?

Robert Morris, the Philadelphia merchant later called the Financier of the Revolution, absented himself on July 2 so Pennsylvania's delegation could vote yes, then signed on August 2, 1776.

Which Connecticut signer also signed the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution?

Roger Sherman is the only person who signed all four founding papers, the Continental Association included; at the 1787 Convention he also helped broker the Connecticut Compromise between the large and small states.

Which 1773 protest led Parliament to pass the Coercive Acts and close Boston's port?

The Boston Tea Party of December 16, 1773 sent some 340 chests of East India Company tea into the harbor; the Tea Act had actually made that tea cheaper, but colonists refused the tax that came with it.

Who was the oldest delegate to sign the Declaration of Independence?

Benjamin Franklin was 70 when he signed, 44 years older than the youngest signer, Edward Rutledge; weeks earlier he had been one of the two committee members who edited the draft.

After the Declaration was read in New York on 9 July 1776, a statue of George III was turned into what?

Musket balls: a crowd pulled down the lead statue on Bowling Green after hearing the Declaration, and tradition says the metal was melted down and cast into some 42,000 bullets.

Which Pennsylvania delegate, thinking the Declaration premature, refused to sign it?

John Dickinson thought independence premature and stayed out of the vote, yet he then left Congress to serve as a general in the Pennsylvania militia, and in 1787 he helped word the Constitution.

Which newspaper printed the Declaration of Independence first, on 6 July 1776?

Benjamin Towne's Pennsylvania Evening Post carried the full text on Saturday, July 6, 1776, the first newspaper to print the Declaration; other Philadelphia papers followed within days.

Which New Jersey signer was president of the College of New Jersey, now Princeton?

John Witherspoon, a Scottish-born minister, was the only active clergyman to sign; told the colonies were not yet ripe for independence, he is said to have answered that they were 'in danger of rotting for the want of it'.

What did the Continental Congress order on July 19, 1776, regarding the Declaration of Independence?

Engross it on parchment for signing: the last holdout colony had approved ten days earlier, so Congress could add 'unanimous' to the title, and clerk Timothy Matlack probably did the lettering.

What did the Declaration's signers pledge to each other along with their lives and their fortunes?

Their sacred honor closes the Declaration's last sentence; the danger was real enough that Congress kept the signers' names out of print until January 1777, for fear of British reprisals.

How many guns do US military bases fire in their noon salute on the Fourth of July?

50: one gun for every state in the Union, fired at noon on Independence Day; the salute has grown with the country from the thirteen guns fired in 1777.

Which Massachusetts signer later served as James Madison's vice president?

Elbridge Gerry was Madison's vice president from 1813 until his death in 1814; the word 'gerrymander' mocks the partisan district map he signed as governor in 1812.

Which colony's delegation abstained from the 2 July 1776 independence vote for lack of authorisation from home?

New York's Provincial Congress had fled the city on 30 June as the British approached, so its delegates were only cleared to vote a week after the decision.

Which U.S. President is the only one born on July 4?

Calvin Coolidge was born on July 4, 1872, in Plymouth Notch, Vermont; in 1923 his own father, a justice of the peace, swore him in as president there by the light of a kerosene lamp.

Which Georgia signer of the Declaration was killed in a duel in 1777?

Button Gwinnett challenged his rival Lachlan McIntosh in May 1777; each man shot the other, but only Gwinnett's wound proved fatal, and his scarce signature is now among the most valuable of any signer.

Which US banknote has carried John Trumbull's painting of the Declaration on its back since 1976?

The $2 bill had been discontinued for a decade when it came back in 1976, the nation's 200th-birthday year, with Trumbull's scene newly engraved on its back.

Which passage did Congress cut from the draft Declaration?

A denunciation of the king for the slave trade was struck out, its author later wrote, in deference to two Southern colonies and to Northern merchants who had carried enslaved people.

Who painted the 1851 canvas 'Washington Crossing the Delaware'?

Emanuel Leutze, a German-American painter, completed 'Washington Crossing the Delaware' in 1851; the twelve-by-twenty-one-foot canvas hangs in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Which president, who never signed the Declaration, became the third to die on a Fourth of July?

James Monroe died on July 4, 1831, at the home of his daughter, where he had moved after his wife's death the year before; he was the third of the first five presidents to die on the holiday.

Which three-day Civil War battle ended on July 3, 1863, with Lee's army starting its retreat on Independence Day?

Gettysburg ended with the failure of Pickett's Charge on July 3; Lee began pulling his battered army back toward Virginia on the rainy afternoon of July 4, 1863.

Which newspaper described Philadelphia's 1777 party of toasts, salutes and fireworks?

The Virginia Gazette of July 18, 1777 reported Philadelphia's first-anniversary celebration: thirteen-gun salutes from ships on the Delaware, toasts, bells and fireworks, with vessels decked in red, white and blue bunting.

Which French nobleman joined Washington's army in 1777 and was made a major general at 19?

The Marquis de Lafayette was shot in the leg at Brandywine weeks after Congress commissioned him, yet stayed on the field to steady the retreat, earning Washington's praise.

Which North Carolina town claims the first documented public July 4 event, in 1783?

Salem's Moravian settlers marked July 4, 1783 with Johann Friedrich Peter's music programme 'The Psalm of Joy', and their careful church records are why the town can make the claim.

Which member of the Declaration's drafting committee never signed the finished document?

Robert R. Livingston helped draft the Declaration yet never put his name to it; thirteen years later he administered George Washington's first oath of office as president.

Which colony's Halifax Resolves of April 1776 first authorized its delegates to vote for independence?

North Carolina's Halifax Resolves of April 12, 1776 were the first official colonial action empowering delegates to vote for independence; the state flag still carries that date.

The Liberty Bell's inscription, 'Proclaim Liberty throughout all the land', comes from which book of the Bible?

Leviticus 25:10 describes the jubilee held every fifty years; Isaac Norris may have chosen the verse in 1751 to mark half a century of William Penn's Charter of Privileges.

Which body of water hosts Seattle's major Fourth of July fireworks?

Lake Union: Seattle's Seafair Summer Fourth fires its fireworks from a barge on Lake Union, with crowds watching from Gas Works Park.

Which Canadian city shared the International Freedom Festival with Detroit from 1959 until the events split in 2007?

Windsor, Ontario and Detroit staged the festival jointly to mark Canada Day on July 1 and Independence Day on July 4, until it split in 2007 into Windsor's Summer Fest and Detroit River Days.

Seward, named the nation's Fourth of July City by Congress in 1979, lies in which state?

Nebraska's Seward, a town of about 7,000 near Lincoln, draws tens of thousands of visitors every July 4, several times its own population.

Why did Macy's sit out its July 4 fireworks show in 1986?

Liberty Weekend took over: the four-day celebration of the Statue of Liberty's restoration and centenary staged its own harbor fireworks on July 4, 1986, so Macy's stepped aside for a year.

Which Tchaikovsky piece accompanies the traditional cannon fire at the Boston Pops Fourth of July show?

The 1812 Overture celebrates Russia's defence against Napoleon, not the American war of the same year, yet its cannon fire is a Fourth of July fixture.

Which network broadcasts A Capitol Fourth, the July 4 concert staged on the West Lawn of the US Capitol?

PBS turned the National Symphony Orchestra's Independence Day concerts on the Capitol lawn, begun in 1979, into an annual national telecast.

Who composed the melody of 'America the Beautiful'?

Samuel A. Ward, a Newark church organist, wrote the hymn tune 'Materna' in 1882; it was joined to Katharine Lee Bates's words in 1910, after Ward's death in 1903.

Which English cathedral rang its bells for The Star-Spangled Banner on July 4 in 2019-20?

Gloucester Cathedral honours John Stafford Smith, composer of the tune 'To Anacreon in Heaven' that the anthem borrows, who was born in Gloucester in 1750 as the cathedral organist's son.

Who urged her husband in March 1776 to 'remember the ladies' as Congress weighed independence?

Abigail Adams warned that the ladies would 'foment a Rebellion' if ignored; her husband replied two weeks later that he could not but laugh at her 'extraordinary Code of Laws'.

Which seaside amusement district hosts Nathan's Famous hot dog eating contest every Fourth of July?

Coney Island is where Nathan Handwerker opened his stand in 1916, undercutting his old employer by selling hot dogs for a nickel; the contest is held outside that original restaurant.

Who won the 2024 Nathan's women's contest with a record 51 hot dogs?

Miki Sudo's 51 broke her own record and brought her tenth title in eleven years; the one contest she missed was 2021's, which she sat out while pregnant.

Whom did Joey Chestnut dethrone at the Nathan's hot dog contest in 2007?

Takeru Kobayashi had won six straight titles since 2001, when he nearly doubled the old record on his debut; Chestnut beat him by 66 hot dogs to 63.

Who beat Joey Chestnut at the 2015 Nathan's hot dog contest?

Matt Stonie ate 62 hot dogs to Chestnut's 60 in 2015, ending a run of eight straight titles; Chestnut took the crown back a year later with 70.

How many hot dogs did Chestnut eat to set the Nathan's contest record in 2021?

He ate 76 in 2021. He ate 83 in a 2024 Netflix showdown with Kobayashi, but that was a different event.

Why was Joey Chestnut missing from the 2024 Nathan's hot dog contest?

A rival plant-based sponsorship with Impossible Foods led organizers to bar Chestnut in 2024; he returned a year later and won his 17th title.

Which network first televised the Macy's fireworks as a special in 1983?

WPIX, New York's Channel 11, first aired the Macy's fireworks as a television special in 1983 and carried it locally for years before a national network took it over.

Which Army unit, 'The Old Guard', performs at A Capitol Fourth?

The National Symphony Orchestra plays the 1812 Overture with artillery.

Bristol's Fourth of July celebration in New England holds which national distinction?

The oldest held continuously: Bristol's began in 1785, when a minister who had fought in the Revolution led the first Patriotic Exercises; its parade is thought to date from the early 1800s.

In which Danish region is Rebild National Park, site of a July 4 festival billed as the largest outside America?

Jutland: Danish-Americans led by Max Henius bought heath land in the Rebild hills in 1911 so emigrants could gather back home, and held their first July 4 celebration there in 1912.

Which director made the 1996 film Independence Day?

Roland Emmerich co-wrote and directed Independence Day, dreaming it up with producer Dean Devlin while promoting Stargate in Europe, after a reporter asked whether he believed in aliens.

Whose 1976 memoir became the Tom Cruise film Born on the Fourth of July?

Ron Kovic, a Marine paralysed in Vietnam, really was born on July 4, 1946; Oliver Stone filmed his memoir in 1989, years after an earlier attempt starring Al Pacino collapsed.

Which songwriter is portrayed by James Cagney in Yankee Doodle Dandy?

George M. Cohan always insisted he was 'born on the Fourth of July', the boast in his song 'The Yankee Doodle Boy', but his baptismal certificate gives July 3, 1878.

'Yankee Doodle' is the official state song of which state?

Connecticut made 'Yankee Doodle' its state song in 1978; legend says a British army surgeon wrote the verses to mock ragged colonial troops, who later sang them as a badge of pride.

Which Sousa march became the official National March by act of Congress in 1987?

'The Stars and Stripes Forever' came to Sousa at sea in 1896: sailing home from Europe after learning his band's manager had died, he composed the march in his head and wrote it down on landing.

Which Colorado summit's view inspired Katharine Lee Bates to write 'America the Beautiful'?

Pikes Peak: Bates reached the top by wagon and mule, and the poem the view inspired was first printed on July 4, 1895, under the plain title 'America'.

Which singer made 'God Bless America' her signature song after a 1938 broadcast?

Kate Smith first sang it on an Armistice Day radio broadcast in 1938; Irving Berlin had written the song twenty years earlier, during World War I, and left it unpublished.

Which illustrator created the famous 1917 'I Want You' Uncle Sam poster?

James Montgomery Flagg used his own face, aged and given a white goatee, for Uncle Sam, saying later that it saved him the trouble of arranging a model.

Which female figure personifies the United States as a nation, alongside Uncle Sam?

Columbia has faded as a national symbol since the Statue of Liberty took over the role, but she lives on as the torch-bearing woman of the Columbia Pictures logo.

Betsy Ross reportedly persuaded Washington to change the flag's stars from what to what?

Six-pointed to five-pointed: the story dates only from 1870, when Ross's grandson William Canby presented it to the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, almost a century after the flag was made.

Why did Congress replace the Pledge of Allegiance's original outstretched-arm gesture with a hand over the heart?

It resembled the Nazi salute, though American schoolchildren had used theirs since 1892, decades before Fascists adopted a similar gesture; Congress made the switch in December 1942.

Which words were added to the Pledge of Allegiance on Flag Day 1954, in the thick of the Cold War?

'Under God' went in months after a Washington minister urged the change in a sermon preached with the president sitting in Abraham Lincoln's old pew; the bill was signed on Flag Day.

Which Philadelphia printer produced the first broadsides of the Declaration?

John Dunlap printed about 200 broadsides on the night of July 4, 1776; a copy found in 1989 behind a $4 flea-market painting later sold for $2.42 million.

Which woman printed the 1777 broadside that first revealed the signers' names?

Mary Katherine Goddard, Baltimore's postmaster and printer, produced the January 1777 broadside ordered by Congress, the first to list the signers' names, adding her own name at the foot.

Where was a previously unknown copy of the first printed Declaration found in 2009?

The UK National Archives at Kew found the copy in 2009 among papers from the American Revolution, probably seized from colonists during the war.

John Trumbull's painting Declaration of Independence, often mistaken for the signing, shows which moment?

The committee presenting its draft on June 28, 1776 is the scene; Trumbull painted in 47 men, among them five who never signed, and left out 14 who did.

Where was Trumbull's Declaration of Independence painting placed in 1826?

The US Capitol rotunda has held it since 1826; Congress commissioned the twelve-by-eighteen-foot canvas in 1817, and Trumbull took it on a four-city tour before delivering it to Washington.

Which Philadelphia event was the first official world's fair held in the United States?

The Centennial Exhibition of 1876 drew nearly 10 million visitors to Fairmount Park, where Alexander Graham Bell demonstrated an early telephone and brought his invention to the world's attention.

Which touring exhibit was a major part of the 1976 Bicentennial?

The American Freedom Train was the idea of a commodities broker who drove steam locomotives in his spare time; over 21 months more than seven million people toured it across all 48 contiguous states.

Which monarch presented a Bicentennial Bell in Philadelphia in July 1976?

Queen Elizabeth II presented the bell on July 6, 1976; it was cast at London's Whitechapel foundry, the firm that had cast the original Liberty Bell for Philadelphia more than two centuries before.

Under what brand did the US Semiquincentennial Commission promote the nation's 250th birthday in 2026?

America250 was the commission's public brand; the 2016 law that created it also ordered a time capsule to be buried in Philadelphia and left sealed until July 4, 2276.

Which Pennsylvania town, home to Zambelli Fireworks and Pyrotecnico, is nicknamed the 'Fireworks Capital of America'?

New Castle, Pennsylvania, home of Zambelli Fireworks and of Pyrotecnico, founded there in 1889, is nicknamed the 'Fireworks Capital of America'.

What did early Chinese people throw into fires for a loud bang, centuries before gunpowder?

Bamboo stems: heated in a fire, the hollow air pockets burst with a bang, a trick used from around 200 BC, long before gunpowder firecrackers.

Which patriotic song opens with the words 'O say can you see'?

'The Star-Spangled Banner' opens 'O say can you see, by the dawn's early light'; Francis Scott Key wrote the words in September 1814.

Which two men respectively sculpted the Statue of Liberty and engineered its iron skeleton?

Bartholdi and Eiffel: Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi shaped the statue, and Gustave Eiffel took over its iron framework after the first engineer died in 1879; her tablet reads JULY IV MDCCLXXVI.

Which movement first called the Pennsylvania State House bell the 'Liberty Bell'?

Abolitionists adopted the bell as a symbol of their cause in the 1830s and gave it the name; the tale that it rang out for independence in 1776 comes from a short story George Lippard published in 1847.

Which two local workmen twice recast the Liberty Bell after it cracked on its very first test ring?

Pass and Stow: Philadelphia founders John Pass and John Stow recast the bell twice in 1753 after the Whitechapel original cracked on its first test ring; their names are on it.

According to tradition, the Liberty Bell first cracked while tolling for whose funeral in 1835?

Chief Justice John Marshall died in 1835, and tradition says the bell cracked tolling for him; no record from the time confirms it, and the split may not have opened until the 1840s.

Which bird did one Founding Father call 'a much more respectable bird' than the bald eagle?

The turkey won that praise in a 1784 letter to his daughter, two years after the bald eagle went on the Great Seal, but the writer never actually proposed it as the national bird.

Which New Jersey signer of the Declaration billed Congress in 1780 for designing the American flag?

Francis Hopkinson asked for 'a Quarter Cask of the public Wine' as his reward; the claim was turned down, partly because he was 'not the only person consulted' on the designs.

Which president ordered the 50-star flag in 1959?

Eisenhower set the design by executive order in August 1959, on the day the fiftieth state joined the Union; no state has been added since, making it the longest-serving version of the flag.

Which two singers had chart hits with 'God Bless America' in the weeks after September 11, 2001?

Celine Dion and LeAnn Rimes both charted with it that autumn, Dion after singing it on a telethon for the victims; members of Congress had sung it together on the Capitol steps on the day of the attacks.

Which Hudson Valley meat packer is traditionally credited as the original 'Uncle Sam'?

Samuel Wilson of Troy supplied the army with beef during the War of 1812 in barrels stamped 'U.S.', and the story goes that soldiers took the letters to mean 'Uncle Sam' Wilson; Congress endorsed the tale in 1961.

Which actor plays the fighter pilot who helps save Earth in the 1996 film Independence Day?

Will Smith plays Marine pilot Steven Hiller, who takes the controls of an alien ship, hidden since it crashed at Roswell decades earlier, for the final strike on the invaders.

Who declared in 1821 that America 'goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy'?

John Quincy Adams, then Secretary of State, gave the address in the House of Representatives on July 4, 1821, arguing America should be 'the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all' but champion only her own.

Which other federal holiday has the words 'Independence Day' in its official legal name?

Juneteenth is 'Juneteenth National Independence Day' in federal law; it marks June 19, 1865, when freedom was proclaimed in Texas, two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation.

Which country gained independence from the United States on July 4, 1946?

The Philippines became independent on July 4, 1946, but in 1962 President Diosdado Macapagal moved the holiday to June 12, the date of the 1898 declaration of independence from Spain.

Which British song lent its melody to 'My Country, 'Tis of Thee'?

'God Save the King' supplied the tune: Samuel Francis Smith came across it in a collection of German songs that composer Lowell Mason had asked him to translate, and wrote new American words instead.

Macy's held its very first fireworks show in 1958 to celebrate what?

The store's 100th anniversary was the occasion, on July 1, 1958, with fireworks fired from barges on the Hudson; Macy's only made its Fourth of July show an annual event in 1976.

Which network has broadcast the Macy's 4th of July Fireworks special since 2000?

NBC has aired the Macy's 4th of July Fireworks special since 2000 and also carries the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

In 'Yankee Doodle', what did 'macaroni' mean to eighteenth-century listeners?

A flashy London fashion: 'macaronis' were young Englishmen who came home from Europe flaunting towering wigs and foreign airs, so the verse mocks a bumpkin who thinks one feather makes him stylish.

'Yankee Doodle' is said to have been played at the 1777 British surrender following which battle?

Saratoga: when the British army surrendered there in 1777, American musicians are said to have played 'Yankee Doodle', flinging the old taunt back at the men who once sang it.

In the song 'Yankee Doodle', what does the rider call the feather he sticks in his cap?

Macaroni was 1770s slang for an over-the-top dresser. The British joke was that a naive Yankee thought a single feather made him the height of fashion.

Which children's classic began as a story told to three sisters on an Oxford boat trip on 4 July 1862?

Alice in Wonderland grew from a tale improvised for ten-year-old Alice Liddell, who asked its author to write it down. The outing became known as the 'golden afternoon'.

Which 1975 thriller sees a mayor keep Amity Island's beaches open for the Fourth of July weekend?

Jaws was the highest-grossing film in history until Star Wars arrived two years later. Its wide summer release became the template for the Hollywood blockbuster.

Which state's admission put a 50th star on the American flag, first flown on July 4, 1960?

Hawaii became a state in August 1959, but a new star has to wait for the following July 4. Alaska's star had gone up just one year earlier.

Which Marvel hero from Brooklyn has a movie-canon birthday of July 4, 1918?

Captain America's alter ego, Steve Rogers, shares his birthday with the nation. The character first appeared in a comic dated March 1941, punching Hitler on the cover.

Which Yankees star told a July 4, 1939 crowd he was the 'luckiest man on the face of the earth'?

Lou Gehrig had just been forced to retire by the nerve disease ALS. That year the Yankees made his number 4 the first uniform number retired in Major League Baseball.

Which planet did NASA's Pathfinder reach on July 4, 1997, bouncing down on airbags with a tiny rover?

Mars got its first wheeled visitor that day: Sojourner, a 23-pound rover and the first to operate beyond the Earth–Moon system.

What does the Statue of Liberty hold in her left hand, inscribed with a date in Roman numerals?

A tablet in Liberty's left hand reads JULY IV MDCCLXXVI, the date of American independence. A broken chain also lies at her feet, half-hidden by her robes.

Which New Orleans jazz trumpeter long claimed to have been born on July 4, 1900?

Louis Armstrong often gave that patriotic date, but he is believed to have been born on August 4, 1901. His home city renamed its main airport for him in 2001.

Which explorers spent July 4, 1804 on the Missouri River, weeks into their journey to the Pacific?

Lewis and Clark marked the day by naming a stream Independence Creek, a name it still carries near Atchison, Kansas.

In 'America the Beautiful', which color describes the 'waves of grain' in the song's opening verse?

Amber waves were the Kansas wheat fields Katharine Lee Bates saw from a train in 1893. Her poem first appeared in print for the Fourth of July in 1895.

Which land deal, nearly doubling the size of the United States, was announced to the public on July 4, 1803?

The Louisiana Purchase cost $15 million, less than three cents an acre. American envoys had hoped only to buy New Orleans and were stunned to be offered the whole territory.

Which actor earned his first Oscar nomination as a paralysed Vietnam veteran in Born on the Fourth of July?

Tom Cruise's performance was one of the drama's eight Oscar nominations. It won two, for Best Director and Best Film Editing.

Which actor plays the fighter-pilot president who joins the July 4 counterattack in 1996's Independence Day?

Bill Pullman's President Whitmore is a Gulf War veteran who climbs into a jet for the final battle. The alien-invasion epic was the highest-grossing film of 1996.

Which actor plays a historian who steals the Declaration of Independence in 2004's National Treasure?

Nicolas Cage's character takes the document to keep it from a rival thief, then has to pay for it in the gift shop when a cashier mistakes it for a souvenir copy.

Which Russian-born songwriter gave the royalties of his 'God Bless America' to the Boy and Girl Scouts?

Irving Berlin wrote it in 1918 for an army revue, set it aside, and revived it twenty years later as a 'peace song' while Hitler rose in Europe.

Which Maryland lawyer wrote the U.S. national anthem's words after watching a British bombardment in 1814?

Francis Scott Key began the poem on the back of a letter from his pocket, stuck aboard a truce ship. It was printed within a week, set to a popular British tune.

By military custom, into which shape is the American flag folded so only its blue field of stars shows?

A triangle is tradition rather than law: the fold is not part of the official Flag Code. It usually takes thirteen triangular folds to finish the job.

What is the English meaning of 'E pluribus unum', the Latin motto on the Great Seal of the United States?

'Out of many, one' runs to thirteen letters in Latin, a nod to the original colonies. Artist Pierre Eugene du Simitiere suggested it for the seal in 1776.

Which Boston silversmith made a midnight ride in 1775 to warn that British troops were on the march?

Paul Revere owes much of his fame to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, whose 1861 poem turned the ride into American legend.

Which Virginia orator closed a 1775 speech with the cry 'Give me liberty or give me death!'?

Patrick Henry backed the words with action: a year later he became the first governor of an independent Virginia, an office he held twice.

At which Virginia port did Lord Cornwallis surrender his army in 1781, all but ending the Revolutionary War?

Yorktown's surrender ceremony went ahead without Cornwallis, who claimed illness and sent his deputy to hand over the sword.

At which Pennsylvania winter camp did Baron von Steuben drill the Continental Army in 1778?

Valley Forge was a camp, not a battlefield, yet an estimated 1,700 to 2,000 soldiers died there from disease.

Which American general's name became a byword for treason after he plotted to hand West Point to the British?

Benedict Arnold was promised £20,000 for the fort. The plot collapsed when militiamen caught a British major carrying the papers, and Arnold fled to fight for the other side.

Which American spy hanged in 1776 is said to have regretted having 'but one life to lose for my country'?

Nathan Hale was the only volunteer when a spy was needed behind enemy lines. He was 21 years old when the British caught and executed him.

Which Revolutionary War battle gave rise to the legendary order 'Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes'?

Bunker Hill was fought mostly on neighbouring Breed's Hill. Whether or not the line was ever spoken, the defenders were so short of powder that every shot had to count.

In which city was the Liberty Bell cast in 1752, only to crack on its first test ring in Philadelphia?

London's Whitechapel Bell Foundry, then trading as Lester and Pack, made the bell. The firm later insisted it had been damaged in transit or struck by a clumsy ringer.

Which metal's compounds give fireworks their blue, the color pyrotechnicians find hardest to get right?

Copper compounds glow blue only at just the right temperature, so a deep, rich blue is seen as the mark of an experienced fireworks maker.

Which condiment names the bejeweled belt won by the men's champion of Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest?

Mustard is the color of the men's belt, while the women's champion has taken home a pink one since 2011. The contest's 1916 origin story was a publicity invention of the 1970s.

Which Southern city has hosted the Peachtree Road Race, a Fourth of July 10K, since 1970?

Atlanta's first race drew just 110 runners. By the late 1970s it had grown into the world's largest 10K.

Which folk singer wrote 'This Land Is Your Land' in 1940, tired of hearing a rival patriotic hit on the radio?

Woody Guthrie first gave his reply the sarcastic title 'God Blessed America for Me'. He renamed it before it became one of the country's best-known folk songs.

Which country singer wrote and recorded the 1984 patriotic anthem 'God Bless the U.S.A.'?

Lee Greenwood's signature song found its biggest audiences years later, surging during the Gulf War and reaching number 16 on the Hot 100 after the September 11 attacks.

Which band's 1972 hit 'Saturday in the Park' was sparked, a bandmate recalled, by a July 4 visit to Central Park?

Chicago's Robert Lamm came back to the hotel excited by the steel drum players, singers, dancers and jugglers, as saxophonist Walter Parazaider told it. Lamm credits film he shot there.

Which country singer launched his annual Fourth of July Picnic concert at a Texas ranch in 1973?

Willie Nelson got the idea after playing a festival on the same Dripping Springs ranch a year earlier. His first picnic drew an estimated 40,000 people.

Which songwriter of 'Oh! Susanna' and 'Camptown Races' was born on July 4, 1826?

Stephen Foster, known as 'the father of American music', also wrote 'My Old Kentucky Home' and 'Beautiful Dreamer' before his death at just 37.

Which writer began two years of simple living in a self-built house beside Walden Pond on July 4, 1845?

Henry David Thoreau stayed two years, two months and two days on land owned by his friend Ralph Waldo Emerson. The book he drew from it did not appear until 1854.

Which long-predicted particle did CERN announce it had found on 4 July 2012, using the Large Hadron Collider?

The Higgs boson is often called the 'God particle', after a 1993 book. Peter Higgs and François Englert, who predicted it, won the Nobel Prize in Physics the following year.

On July 4, 2005, NASA's Deep Impact mission deliberately crashed a probe into which kind of object?

A comet named Tempel 1 took the hit. The collision threw up a dust cloud so large and bright that it hid the fresh crater from the spacecraft's cameras.

Which Mississippi River stronghold surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant on July 4, 1863, after a long siege?

Vicksburg was the last major Confederate stronghold on the river. When Port Hudson fell five days later, the Union held the whole Mississippi for the rest of the war.

Which president fell fatally ill after reportedly feasting on cherries and iced milk on July 4, 1850?

Zachary Taylor died of a stomach illness five days later, only 16 months into his term. The party was a fundraiser for a national monument still under construction.

Which NASCAR driver took his 200th and final win at Daytona on July 4, 1984, with President Reagan watching?

Richard Petty was congratulated at the track by Ronald Reagan, the first sitting president to attend a NASCAR race. Reagan had given the 'start your engines' command by phone from Air Force One.

Which first Black heavyweight champion beat Jim Jeffries in Reno on July 4, 1910, in the 'Fight of the Century'?

Jack Johnson put the former champion on the canvas for the first time in his career before the corner stopped the fight in the 15th round. Jeffries had come out of retirement for the fight.

Which frigate, the oldest commissioned warship afloat, is towed around Boston Harbor for the Fourth of July?

USS Constitution is turned around so that her hull weathers evenly on both sides. She earned the nickname 'Old Ironsides' in battle with the British frigate Guerriere.

Which third ingredient joins charcoal and sulfur in gunpowder, the mixture that powers fireworks?

Saltpeter, or potassium nitrate, supplies the oxygen for the blast, while the other two ingredients act as fuel.

Which coin carried a colonial drummer on its reverse for the 1976 Bicentennial?

The quarter's drummer was picked in a nationwide design competition. Every coin in the set carried the double date 1776–1976, whichever year it was actually struck.

Which term names Earth's farthest point from the Sun, reached each year within days of the Fourth of July?

Aphelion falls in early July, about two weeks after the June solstice, so the Northern Hemisphere has its summer when Earth is farthest from the Sun.

Which words open the Declaration of Independence, ahead of its famous line about 'self-evident' truths?

'When in the Course of human events' begins a sentence arguing that a people who break away owe the world their reasons. 'We the People' came eleven years later, in another founding document.

Which animal appears above the words 'Dont Tread on Me' on the yellow Gadsden flag, designed in 1775?

A rattlesnake, coiled and ready to strike, was already a symbol of unity among the colonies. The flag's own lettering leaves the apostrophe out of 'Dont'.

Which sailor and dockworker is traditionally regarded as the first person killed in the Boston Massacre?

Crispus Attucks, a man of African and Native American descent, had spent much of his life at sea. He was struck in the chest by two ricocheting bullets.

Which waterway linking the Hudson River to the Great Lakes had its ground broken on July 4, 1817?

The Erie Canal was mocked as 'Clinton's Ditch' after its chief backer, Governor DeWitt Clinton. Its first 15 miles opened two years after the groundbreaking.