school, Otterbein University in Westerville, Ohio. That same year, he married Harriet Copeland, an artist who also taught at Otterbein. They had three children: Jessie, Clara, and Louis; two of the three became medical doctors. In 1867, Thompson left Otterbein to become superintendent of schools in Troy, Ohio. After four years in that position, he returned to teaching, serving again as a mathematics professor in Westfield College, a United Brethren school in Westfield, Illinois. In 1872, Thompson was elected president of Otterbein University, and remained in that position until 1886. He received a doctorate in divinity from Otterbein the following year. As president, Thompson continued to teach and delivered speeches around the country on school or church business. Thompson took office shortly before the financial Panic of 1873, with the result that his primary concern as president was keeping the college funded. In this he was successful, although the college had to borrow money to stay afloat until the economy recovered. After the initial debt was incurred, Thompson worked to raise donations to pay it off more quickly. He also worked to attract new professors to teach at Otterbein, improving both the quality of education and the school's reputation among scholars. Thompson was involved in organizing the General Board of Education of the United Brethren Church, which served as a coordinating body for the schools affiliated with the church. Political career Thompson had identified with the Republican Party since its founding in the 1850s, but in 1874 he left it to join the new Prohibition Party. The Prohibitionists, more of a movement than a party, focused their efforts on banning alcohol. Like Thompson, most party members came from pietist churches, and most were former Republicans. He was the party's nominee for the federal House of Representatives from Ohio's 12th district at a special election held that year because of the resignation of Democrat Hugh J. Jewett, as well as for the full term that would follow. Thompson lost both, receiving only a few hundred votes and losing to Democratic candidate William E. Finck. He served as chairman of the Prohibition National Convention in 1876 in Cleveland, but the young party's nominees fared poorly, winning fewer than 7000 votes nationwide. In 1880, the party nominated Thompson for vice president, joining a ticket headed by Neal Dow of Portland, Maine, the author of one of the nation's first municipal prohibition laws. Only