In 1839, Dr. McGuffey accepted the presidency of the Ohio University at
Athens, Ohio, which office he held for four years. During these years
his faculties were at their fullest development. He had become an
experienced, scholarly teacher and a popular speaker on religious and
educational subjects. The students at Athens held him in the highest
esteem, and the influence of his teaching became deeper as years rolled
by and experience emphasized his lessons.

In 1839 he was honored with the degree of Doctor of Laws conferred upon
him by the Indiana University, of which his former teacher and friend,
Dr. Wylie, was then president.

The income of the Ohio University came chiefly from the rents of two
entire townships of land which had been given it for an endowment. This
land was lawfully revalued at the end of ten years. The revaluation was
contested in the courts by the tenants. The Supreme Court decided in
favor of the university; but the farmers induced the legislature in 1843
to pass a law which fixed the income of the university from these lands
at a sum so low as to cause the doors of the institution to be closed
for five years.

Dr. McGuffey returned to Cincinnati and was for two years a professor in
Woodward College, now Woodward High School.

[University of Virginia]

In 1845 he was appointed professor of Natural and Moral Philosophy in
the University of Virginia. This position he filled with credit to
himself and with great acceptance to the students in that institution
for more than a quarter of a century and until his death on May 4, 1873.