Fred Thompson

Freddie Dalton Thompson (August 19, 1942 – November 1, 2015) was an American politician, attorney, lobbyist, columnist, actor, and radio personality. A member of the Republican Party, he served as a United States senator from Tennessee from 1994 to 2003. He was an unsuccessful candidate in the Republican Party presidential primaries for the 2008 United States presidential election.

He chaired the International Security Advisory Board at the U.S. Department of State, was a member of the U.S.–China Economic and Security Review Commission, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, as well as a visiting fellow with the American Enterprise Institute, specializing in national security and intelligence.

Usually credited as Fred Dalton Thompson, he appeared in a number of movies and television shows including Matlock, The Hunt for Red October, Die Hard 2, In the Line of Fire, Days of Thunder, and Cape Fear, as well as in commercials. He frequently portrayed governmental authority figures and military men. In the final months of his U.S. Senate term in 2002, Thompson joined the cast of the NBC television series Law & Order, starring as Manhattan District Attorney Arthur Branch.

Fred Thompson was born on August 19, 1942, at Colbert County Hospital (now Helen Keller Memorial Hospital) in Sheffield, Alabama. He was the son of Ruth Inez (née Bradley) and Fletcher Session Thompson, a used car salesman born in Lauderdale County, Alabama, on August 26, 1919, and who died in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, on May 27, 1990. Thompson was of primarily English, and distant Dutch, ancestry.

He was raised in Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, where he attended public schools and graduated from Lawrence County High School in 1960. During high school, he played football, and afterward worked during the day at the local post office and at night in the Murray bicycle assembly plant.

Thompson was raised attending churches of the Churches of Christ, and often credited his values to both his family upbringing and church teachings. In a 2007 interview, he stated, "I attend church when I'm in Tennessee. I'm [living] in McLean right now. I don't attend regularly when I'm up there." Later in life, he occasionally attended Vienna Presbyterian Church in Vienna, Virginia. He rarely spoke about religion during his 2008 presidential campaign, saying, "Me getting up and talking about what a wonderful person I am and that sort of thing, I'm not comfortable with that, and I don't think it does me any good."

In September 1959, at age 17, Thompson married Sarah Elizabeth Lindsey after learning she was pregnant. Their first child, Freddie Dalton "Tony" Thompson Jr., was born in April 1960. Two more children, Daniel and Elizabeth, followed soon after.

Thompson initially enrolled at Florence State College (now the University of North Alabama), becoming the first in his family to attend college. He later transferred to Memphis State University (now the University of Memphis), where he earned a double major in philosophy and political science in 1964. He was then awarded a scholarship to attend Vanderbilt University Law School, earning his Juris Doctor degree in 1967. During this time, both he and Sarah worked to support their growing family and cover his education expenses. The couple divorced in 1985.