The Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in July 1976, when it hosted a statewide convention of the American Legion. Soon after, a pneumonia-like disease killed 29 people and sickened 182 more who had been in the hotel. The vast majority were members of the convention. The negative publicity associated with what became known as "Legionnaires' Disease" caused occupancy at the Bellevue-Stratford to plummet to 4 percent and the hotel finally closed on November 18, 1976. In 1977, Dr. Joseph McDade discovered a new bacterium, which was identified as the causative organism. It thrives in hot, damp places like the water of the cooling towers for the
American Legion Veterans of the Korean War were approved for membership in The American Legion in 1950, and The American Legion Child Welfare Foundation was formed in 1954. On May 30, 1969, the Cabin John Bridge, which carried the Capital Beltway (I-495) across the Potomac River northwest of Washington, was officially renamed to the "American Legion Memorial Bridge" in a ceremony led by Lt. Gen. Lewis B. Hershey, director of the U.S. Selective Service System. In 1976, an outbreak of bacterial pneumonia occurred in a convention of The American Legion at the Bellevue Stratford Hotel in Philadelphia. This pneumonia killed 34 people