There have been 47 vice presidents in America's 238 years, spanning John Adams to Joe Biden.
One of those – William Rufus DeVane King – called Alabama home and he represents the closest any state resident has come to the top office in the land.
The story starts in North Carolina
King wasn't actually born in what would become Alabama. He started his life April 7, 1786 in North Carolina. He went to college there, eventually entering the practice of law and later, politics. He was elected to the North Carolina House of Commons and then the U.S. House of Representatives.
After serving in diplomatic posts overseas, King followed his brother, Thomas DeVane King, to the Alabama territory. King purchased 750 acres of land on the Alabama River in Dallas County where he established a plantation named Chestnut Hill that operated mainly on slave labor. He and other plantation owners and business leaders named a nearby town Selma, a name that means "high throne."
Alabama became a state in 1819 and King was tapped to help draft the state's constitution. He was then elected to the U.S. Senate, eventually serving four terms representing Alabama. King served as president pro tempore of the Senate from 1836-1841 before being appointed by President John Tyler as U.S. Minister to France. He landed back in the Senate upon his return, serving until 1852.
The Senate's Historical Office notes King was not noted for his oratory and was perhaps best known for wearing long wigs, a practice that had long since fallen out of favor. One historian less-than-flatteringly described the Alabama Senator as a "tall, prim, wigtopped, mediocrity."
On to the vice presidency...
In 1852, Alabama Democrats pushed hard for King to be nominated for the vice presidency on the same ticket as New Hampshire's Franklin Pierce.
The attractive North/South ticket defeated Whig candidates Winfield Scott and William Graham but all was not well with King, who had been plagued with a persistent cough. Ill with tuberculosis he traced back to his time in Paris, he traveled to the temperate climate in Cuba in an effort to regain his health. Unable to return to Washington, D.C. to take the oath of office, King received special Congressional permission to take his oath outside the U.S. He was sworn in as America's 13th vice president on March 24, 1853.
The trip to Cuba didn't help. King returned to Selma where he died one day later on April 18, 1853 at age 67. He holds the record as the shortest term of office for any U.S. Vice President, having held the position for almost five weeks. He never presided over any legislative session as vice president.
King is buried in Live Oak Cemetery in Selma. His will freed many of the slaves at Chestnut Hill. Newspaper reports from the time summed him up this way:
"Though not, perhaps, brilliant, he was better sensible, honest, never running into ultraism, but in the contests between the state and the federal government, maintaining the true conservative medium, so necessary to the preservation of the constitution, the rights of the states and the republic."
King's private life still a point of contention
Historians have long speculated on King's private life, which was openly questioned during his lifetime, too.
"I don't think there's any question that King was a closet homosexual," Selma lawyer J.L. Chestnutt told the Tuscaloosa News in 2010. "That is why (President) Andrew Jackson called him 'Miss Nancy' and why others mocked him."
Most of the questions center on his relationship with the 15th president of the U.S. James Buchanan. He and Buchanan, neither of whom married, were roommates for 15 years during their time in Congress. Press reports at the time speculated on the men's relationships and the post master general reportedly called the pair "Buchanan and his wife."
Both men's relatives burned their correspondence to each other after their deaths. Some letters did survive, and point to their close relationship.
One of those letters was written by Buchanan when King moved to Paris to become ambassador to France.
Buchanan wrote: 'I am now "solitary and alone," having no companion in the house with me. I have gone a wooing to several gentlemen, but have not succeeded with any one of them. I feel that it is not good for man to be alone; and should not be astonished to find myself married to some old maid who can nurse me when I am sick, provide good dinners for me when I am well, and not expect from me any very ardent or romantic affection.'
The Senate Historical Office describes the men's relationship this way: "King and Buchanan – both lifelong bachelors – became known as the "Siamese twins."
While speculation about the two existed during their lifetimes, it was never confirmed.
"I suspect if the whole truth had ever been known about King during his lifetime, he would not have achieved one-third of his splendid accomplishments on behalf of this nation," Chestnutt said.