There are many people in the United States who have served as vice presidents, but we tend to forget who the vice presidents are and what their names are. One of the most forgotten men is Richard Johnson, who served under President Martin Van Buren from 1837 to 1841. Of course, there's a reason he only has one term.
Richard Johnson first became involved in politics in 1804, when at the age of 22 he was elected to the Kentucky House of Representatives. The state constitution prohibited members under the age of 25, but Johnson was so popular that everyone chose to forget the age rule. Two years later, he was elected as a member of the United States House of Representatives. At the age of 25, he happened to be at the beginning of the congressional session.
In 1813, during the increasingly inaccurately named War of 1812, Johnson became so famous for killing the Native American war hero Tecumseh that when running for vice president in 1836, he used the campaign slogan: "La Mzee Dempsey, Colonel Johnson killed Tecumseh." After he lost by one electoral vote, the Senate invoked the 12th Amendment to elect him, the only time the Senate voted for Vice President.
After his father died in 1815, he began a relationship with a slave woman named Julia Chinn. Johnson could not legally marry her due to his age, but they were engaged at the time, and although his mother forced him to end the relationship, his ex-fiancée soon gave birth to their child, and the Johnsons jointly raised their daughter, named Called Celia.
Johnson was similarly open to his choice of friends, including John Sims of Kentucky, who firmly believed that the Earth was hollow and that its center was populated by well-developed mole people. After being elected vice president, Johnson even asked the Senate on behalf of his friends to seek congressional funding for an Arctic expedition to find the secret entrance to Middle-earth and meet the mole people, but the plan later failed.
Johnson soon found life as Vice President of the United States quite boring, so in 1837, he took a nine-month leave of absence, returned to his hometown, and opened a tavern on the farm. Not long after, his often perfunctory attitude toward his duties led President Van Buren to politely inform Johnson that his services were no longer needed up for re-election, so he returned to Kentucky to run his own tavern and launch A series of failed attempts to regain political office. He was finally re-elected to the Kentucky House of Representatives in 1850, but died of a stroke within two weeks of his term.
