President Garfield Died Here
Long Branch, New Jersey
After President James Garfield was shot by an assassin in 1881, he lived for over 80 days -- so long that his doctors moved him by train to a beach cottage on the Jersey Shore, hoping that the sea air would revive him. It didn't; the late summer weather was unusually hot, and the President died. The cottage was torn down, and the spot was neglected until the 1950s, when an eight-year-old named Bruce Frankel lobbied to have a small granite slab placed at the site. It still stands, but the rest of the property is now occupied by someone's garage.