BURLINGTON, Wis. - A fishing shack on the banks of Honey Creek in the town of Burlington, Wis., seems an unlikely place to kick off a presidential campaign. | VIDEO: Candidate sings his platform | Election page

In a way, it isn't, since Thomas Boyle quietly announced his write-in candidacy for president of the United States when he called into a talk show on Wisconsin Public Radio more than a year ago.

The fishing shack is a place of inspiration for Boyle, who retired from selling real estate in Chicago. He hasn't made a big splash, until now, days before the election. It's the place where he gave a rare interview and sang one of his campaign songs. Music is his chosen form of communication and the best way he knows to get out a message.

"I've had to run a different kind of campaign," said Boyle, who calls himself a moderate Democrat. "I've just laid back and let the two other candidates beat themselves to pieces."

No one has ever won the presidency as a write-in candidate and there are only two examples of successful write-in candidates in national politics, according to John Cooper, a professor of U.S. history at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Henry Cabot Lodge won the New Hampshire Republican primary as a write-in in 1964 and Strom Thurmond was elected to the U.S. Senate as a write-in in 1954, Cooper said.

Write-in candidacies are often done as a protest, because someone doesn't like the choices. Somebody running a write-in candidacy for president is a little different.

"Some of them feel pretty strongly about it. They're not happy with either party," Cooper said. "People can always be dissatisfied. I can see all kinds of reasons. I think it is very good that people have the freedom to make a choice."

The chances of winning at the national level are slim, according to Cooper. It is very unlikely to run a national campaign and win enough states. A person needs a huge organization behind them, Cooper said.

Boyle, 64, is no stranger to the world of national politics. He served as a page in the House of Representatives when he was 14, a job he got with the help of his father, Charles A. Boyle, a congressman who represented the north side of Chicago in the late 1950s before he was killed in a car accident.

His father served alongside Prescott Bush, President George W. Bush's grandfather. Boyle's experiences with his father in Congress helped inform the political views he holds to this day.

"Leaders are born. You can't make a leader," Boyle said.

He was a page on the Democratic side of the House and met most of the presidents after Truman.

Boyle said he realized that most of the people serving in Congress were lawyers who didn't seem to know much about economics, so he decided to study economics at Georgetown University.

More recently, Boyle finds himself displeased with what he sees as the lack of response from Sen. Barack Obama or Sen. John McCain to things like the mortgage crisis in this country.

"I'm not going to sit here and bash these people. The big problem we have today, they're a part of the problem," Boyle said.

Write-in candidates might have better luck winning in local elections, but they don't stand a chance in national elections, said John McAdams, a political science professor at Marquette University.

"You can call yourself a candidate, but it's hopeless," McAdams said. "We, as political scientists, tend to dismiss that sort of thing as totally irrational."

Making a bid for the White House from Burlington might seem like a long shot, but it's a dream that isn't out of the realm of possibility, Boyle said.

"You can write anybody's name on that bottom line. Maybe that's a tall order but that's what I'm going to do," Boyle said. "I think there are a lot of people who don't like either candidate."