Born on March 29, 1790, in Greenway VA, John Tyler was the son of a governor of Virginia. Tyler graduated from College of William and Mary in 1807 and was elected to the Virginia Legislature in 1811. He went to the United States House of Representatives in 1816 and served until 1821, when he was elected Governor of Virginia. After a period in the United States Senate, Tyler was elected vice-president in 1840. Following the early death of William Henry Harrison, he became the first vice-president elevated to the presidency as a result of the death of a president.
The Whigs who had championed Harrison were soon disappointed in Tyler. After differences with Henry Clay over banking, the Whig Party voted Tyler out of the party and almost the entire cabinet resigned. His last act as president was to sign a resolution annexing Texas. He was not renominated in 1844.
With the outbreak of the Civil War, Tyler became a member of the Confederate House of Representatives. He died in Richmond on January 18, 1862.
