Introduction

Biography

Van was the son of Burt Fen­ton Thomp­son and Ca­ro­line Cal­lie Ber­ry Mor­ey, and hus­band of Eu­la Mai Bo­gle.

He gra­du­at­ed from the New Eng­land Con­ser­va­to­ry of Mu­sic, Bos­ton, Mas­sa­chu­setts, and earned a BMus de­gree from Lin­coln-Jeff­er­son Uni­ver­si­ty in 1919. He was elect­ed a fel­low of the Am­er­ican Guild of Or­gan­ists in the same year.

He taught at Wood­land Col­lege, Jones­bo­ro, Ar­kan­sas for a year.

In 1911, he moved to De­Pauw Uni­ver­si­ty, Green­cast­le, In­di­ana, where he served the School of Mu­sic for 45 years. He was the uni­ver­si­ty or­gan­ist and taught or­gan, pi­ano, and com­po­si­tion. De­Pauw award­ed him an hon­or­ary doc­tor­ate in mu­sic in 1935.

He di­rect­ed the De­Pauw School of Mu­sic from 1937 un­til his re­tire­ment in 1956.