predecessor successor death_date birth_place death_place religion title profession birth_date term_start order image article_title term_end name
cornelius conway felton horace mann charles william eliot austin craig 21 november 1891 new brunswick , new jersey waltham , massachusetts unitarian president of harvard university president of antioch college clergyman and educator january 7 , 1818 1862 1860 20th 2nd thomas hill b1818.jpg thomas hill -lrb- clergyman -rrb-
 1868 1862 thomas hill
thomas hill -lrb- clergyman -rrb-

thomas hill -lrb- january 7 , 1818 -- november 21 , 1891 -rrb- was an american unitarian clergyman , mathematician , scientist , philosopher , and educator .
taught to read at an early age , hill read voraciously and was well regarded for his capacious and accurate memory .
his father taught him botany , and he took a delight in nature and devised scientific instruments , one of calculated eclipses and was subsequently awarded the scott medal by the franklin institute .
though not formally educated in his youth , hill briefly attended the lower dublin academy in holmesburg , pennsylvania and the leicester academy in massachusetts , now the leicester campus of becker college , leaving in 1837 .
he earned his a.b. and d.div .
from harvard university in 1843 and 1845 respectively .
he was later made an honorary member of the hasty pudding .
hill was president of antioch college from 1860 to 1862 until the civil war forced the college to shut down ; he then held the presidency of harvard university from 1862 to 1868 .
ill health caused his retirement from harvard , and from 1873 , he was head of the unitarian parish in portland , maine .
thomas hill claimed to have injured his testicle while gardening , an incident that made him wary of laboratory instruction at harvard , warning students not to exert themselves too much in their studies .
his home in waltham , massachusetts , where he began his career , is listed on the national register of historic places .
