here's an interesting history fact about "4th of July":

On the Fourth of July, millions of U.S. citizens will fire up the barbeque and shoot off fireworks in celebration of the Declaration of Independence, a now-sacred document that declares the independence of what were then 13 united colonies from England.

But the Continental Congress voted for the Declaration of Independence on the second of July in 1776. No one signed it until August 2, and the last signatures didn't come until the end of November.


"The only thing that happened on the fourth was they approved the document," said Ronald Hoffman, director of the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Several members of the Congress who voted for independence never signed the document, and several members who signed the document, were absent when the vote was taken, Hoffman added.

John Adams, the second President of the United States, was in 1776 a delegate to the Continental Congress representing the colony of Massachusetts. He wrote in a letter to his wife, Abigail, on July 3, 1776, that "the second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epocha in the history of America."

source: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/06/0629_040629_july4.html