Donald E. “Dux” Thompson of Douglas ran for lieutenant governor in 1978.

Submitted for your approval: The second-greatest ad campaign for a lieutenant governor candidate in Alaska history.

We’ll get to the all-time champion tomorrow.

First, you might be asking yourself: Who the Hell is “Dux” Thompson?

Take comfort in knowing that his statewide name recognition is equal to a majority of the 17 candidates for lite gov whose names are on the August 18 primary election ballot.

Some of the current crop of candidates might as well be in the witness protection program.

Donald E. “Dux” Thompson, 43, had his own program when he ran for lieutenant governor in 1978, one of 13 candidates on the ballot. He was the only “Get with the program, Get with the people” candidate.

The Anchorage newspapers refused to run the fantastic ad for “Dux” that Tom Snapp of the All-Alaska Weekly had no qualms about publishing. It was the one question that everyone had.

The Anchorage Times and Anchorage Daily News version of the ad asked, “Who in the Heck is “Dux” Thompson?” No real person would ask it that way.

“Humor was a part of his being,” Dux’s 2001 obituary said.

One of his campaign slogans was, “We’ve got enough turkeys in state government. We need Dux.”

Dux, who took time off from his job as a maintenance foreman for the city to run for office, found that the voters didn’t need Dux. He collected about 1,000 votes and only won two precincts, both near his home in Douglas.

He ran in a crowded Democratic field that included Red Swanson, John Alexander, Bob Bradley, George Hohman, Charles Konigsberg, Cliff Warren and Katie Hurley. Hurley won in a landslide.

Chancy Croft won the Democratic nomination for governor and went onto lose to Jay Hammond in the fall.

It appeared on primary Election Day that Wally Hickel had beaten Hammond. In fact, the Associated Press declared Hickel the winner. But the vote count went on and Hammond won by 98 votes. It was the most contentious election in Alaska up to that time and it dragged on for months, reaching the Alaska Supreme Court, which rejected Hickel’s claims of fraud.

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State politics has had plenty of turkeys. But only one Dux.