The last sitting Vice-president to win election to the presidency was George Bush, who succeeded Ronald Reagan in 1989. Three other sitting Vice-presidents achieved the same feat: John Adams, succeeding George Washington in 1796; Thomas Jefferson, succeeding Adams in 1800; and Martin van Buren, succeeding Andrew Jackson in 1836.

Eight Vice-presidents assumed the presidency when the President died. John Tyler was the first, taking over when William Henry Harrison died just a few weeks after his inauguration, in 1841. The others are these:

• Millard Fillmore, when Zachary Taylor died, in 1850
• Andrew Johnson, who succeeded the assassinated Abraham Lincoln in 1865
• Chester A. Arthur, who became President when an assassin killed James A. Garfield in 1881
• Theodore Roosevelt, succeeding William McKinley, assassinated in 1901
• Calvin Coolidge, who became President when Warren G. Harding died, in 1923
• Harry Truman, who succeeded Franklin D. Roosevelt when the latter died, in 1945
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Richard Nixon served as Vice-president from 1953 to 1961, when Dwight D. Eisenhower was President. Nixon ran for President in 1960 but lost to John F. Kennedy. Nixon ran for President again in 1968 and won. He was re-electd in 1972. His Vice-president, Spiro Agnew, resigned in 1973 and Nixon appointed as the new Vice-president Gerald Ford, then the Republican leader in the House of Representatives. Nixon himself resigned in 1974, and Ford assumed the presidency.