[IMGCAP(1)] Michigan Rep. Vernon Ehlers was a physics professor in his life before Congress. In this 1960 photo, the future Congressman, at just 26 years old, stands in front of a blackboard at the University of California at Berkeley for his faculty photo. Ehlers earned his Ph.D. in nuclear physics at Berkeley and taught there and later at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich., which is now part of his 3rd Congressional district. According to Ehlers’ biography, the eight-term Republican was the first research physicist elected to Congress.