Washington on his Deathbed, an 1851 portrait by Junius
Brutus Stearns.

George Washington, the American revolutionary leader and
first president of the United States, died at his estate in Mount
Vernon, Virginia. He was 67 years old. His last words were
"’Tis well."

The diagnosis of Washington’s illness and the immediate
cause of his death have been subjects of much debate.       

     
Modern medical authors have concluded that he likely died
from  severe epiglottitis, an inflammation in the throat,
complicated by various treatments which included extensive bloodletting.      
 


        
        
        
        
       

The sarcophagi of George (right) and Martha Washington at
the entrance to their tomb in Mount Vernon.

Marble Statue of George Washington by Jean-Antoine
Houdon, circa 1794 State Capital, Commonwealth of
Virginia, Library of Virginia.

John Jay (December 23, 1745 – May 17, 1829)

(FOX NEWS) – Founding Father John Jay, a towering figure
among the intellectual giants who forged the nation, was
sworn in as first chief justice of the Supreme Court of the
United States on this day in history, Oct. 19, 1789. 

The New York native held the title until resigning in 1795,
among the shortest tenures for the prestigious lifetime
appointment.

Only 16 other people have held the title of Supreme Court
chief justice in the 227 years since.

On the night of May 14, 1829, Jay was stricken with palsy,
probably caused by a stroke. He lived for three more days,
dying in Bedford, New York.

Jay’s childhood home in Rye, New York is a New York
State Historic Site and Westchester County Park.

Jay’s retirement home near Katonah, New York.

Future President Thomas Jefferson, drafter of the Declaration of Independence and the nation’s preeminent political theorist, was
born in Shadwell, Virginia on April 13, 1743. 

On this day in 1751, James Madison, drafter of the Constitution,
recorder of the Constitutional Convention, author of the Federalist 
Papers and fourth president of the United States, was born on a
plantation in Virginia.

Madison first distinguished himself as a student at the College
of New Jersey (now Princeton University), where he successfully completed a four-year course of study in two years and, in 1769,
helped found the American Whig Society, the second literary and
debate society at Princeton (and the world), to rival the previously established Cliosophic Society.

On February 21, 1948, the National Association for Stock Car
Racing, —or NASCAR, as it will come to be widely known—is
officially incorporated. NASCAR racing will go on to become
one of America’s most popular spectator sports, as well as a
multi-billion-dollar industry.

The driving force behind the establishment of NASCAR was
William “Bill” France Sr. (1909-1992), a mechanic and auto-
repair shop owner from Washington, D.C., who in the mid-
1930s moved to Daytona Beach, Florida.

William Henry Getty France
(September 26, 1909 – June 7, 1992)