John Calvin Coolidge was born on July 4, 1872 in the small town of Plymouth, Vermont to Victoria Josephine Moor Coolidge and Colonel John Coolidge. Victoria died when Calvin was 12. He had a sister, Abigail who died at age 14. He married Grace Anna Goodhue, a teacher from Vermont, in 1905.They had two children, John and Calvin.
Coolidge lived an average farm boy's life working on the farm and going to a local schoolhouse for his education. When he reached the age of 13, he attended Black River Academy. He graduated from Amherst College with honors, and entered law and politics in Northampton, Massachusetts. .
Coolidge really had no desire to become anything famous; he just wanted to take over the family store and continue with the farm work he had done all his life. But soon he began to slowly climb the political ladder. In 1898 he was elected to North Hampton City Council, while working in his law office. The other local political positions he held were city solicitor, clerk of the county courts, and chairman of the North Hampton Republican Party organization. In 1907 he was elected to the Massachusetts State House of Representatives. In 1910 he became mayor of Northampton, Massachusetts. Next he was elected to the Massachusetts State Senate and was made Senate president. Then he was elected governor of Massachusetts. In 1920, he was nominated as a candidate for Vice President. With the voter's respect for Coolidge, Harding won the 1920 election easily. .
On August 3, 1923 while Coolidge was vacationing in his father's home, the Secret Service woke him with a report that President Harding died of a massive stroke in San Francisco. He finished out Harding's term and then won the election of 1923 over John W. Davis by a landslide. Coolidge's Vice President was Charles Gates Dawes. His Secretary of State was Charles Evans Hughes from the Harding administration and Frank Billings Kellogg. Andrew William Mellon was Secretary of Treasury to both Harding and Coolidge.