Tivis
Colley Sutherland: Pioneer Doctor of the Frying Pan
By Bonnie Ball
It
was perhaps the inspiration of his ancestors which endowed Tivis Colley
Sutherland with the desire and the ability to love, serve, and get
along with people. He first saw the light of day on February 12, 1880,
on Frying Pan Creek, in what was then Buchanan Co., VA. A few months
after his birth, this section of land was incorporated into the newly-formed
Dickenson Co., VA, which led Tivis' grandfather to remark that he
had lived in three different counties, Russell, Buchanan, and Dickenson,
without ever moving. Tivis' parents were Joshua price and Isabelle
Counts Sutherland, and his paternal grandparents were William and
Sylvia Counts Sutherland. One paternal ancestor, James Sutherland,
had immigrated to Virginia in the late Eighteenth Century, settling
in Bedford Co. Tivis had eight brothers and sisters, only three of
whom lived to maturity: Lydia, who married John Wright in 1900; May,
who married Garland B. Owens in 1909; and Joshua Hoge Tyler, who was
to become one of his state's leading educators and who married Emma
B. Chase.
Tivis grew up in the Frying Pan area as a normal, active boy with
a yen for adventure and fun. His younger brother, J. H. T., and his
cousin, Elihu Jasper Sutherland, were especially fond of relating
stories about Tiv's boyhood. One of their favorite tales had to do
with a three-year-old Tiv and a mythical bear. One day, his grandmother,
who lived about a mile away, came to visit. Tiv's mother seemed concerned
about his habit of running off from the house, and rambling around
in the neighboring woods. His grandmother, hoping to discourage his
wanderlust, said to him, "Tiv, you shouldn't do that. There're lots
of varmints in the woods that could catch and eat you. As I crossed
the walk-log today, I saw a big, black bear in the laurels, and it
looked mighty hungry."
As the two women talked and went about the household chores, they
suddenly missed Tivis. They called and called but received no answer.
They went in search of him, and finally located him near the end of
the walk-log, a quarter of a mile upstream. His frantic mother called
to him, "Tiv, what on earth are you doing away up here in the woods?"
"I'm hunting for Granny's black bear, Maw," came the answer. Then,
turning to his grandmother, he inquired eagerly, "Granny, which way
did the bear go?"
Judge Elihu Jasper Sutherland has recorded another boyhood anecdote
about his colorful cousin:
Occasionally Tivis would come up to my grandfather's home, where I
also lived - at what is now called Fair View - to help us with the
farm work. Grandpa Billy usually supervised out work. One day, when
Tivis was about sixteen, he came up to work in the hayfield. Grandpa
asked him if he could use a scythe, and Tivis assured him that he
was an experienced mower. He was given a scythe and was told where
to mow along the top of a little ridge. Then Grandpa went to other
tasks for about thirty minutes.
When he returned to Tivis' job, he stopped and watched for a few minutes.
At every sweep of the scythe, Tivis dug the end of the implement into
the ground. Grandpa stood this unorthodox method of mowing as long
as he could and then roared at Tivis:
"I thought you said you could mow! A baby could do better'n you're
doin.! What makes y' stick th' scythe blade in the ground?"
Tiv kept on mowing, and, casually, looking back over his shoulder,
said in a mischievous tone: "I'm tryin' t' smooth your hayfield, Grandpa.
It's awfully rough!"
Tivis had an unusually strong love for horses. He lived about a quarter
mile below the Sulphur Springs Baptist Church on Frying Pan, and he
liked to ride to the monthly meetings. He had a spirited, gaited horse
which he liked to show off to his admiring neighbors. During most
of the summer, the horse was kept in a pasture on the "ridge field",
about a half-mile from his home. On Sundays, Tiv would take the bridle
and climb the steep path to the hill to catch his horse, sometimes
after a merry chase, and then lead him down a narrow, crooked path
to the barn where he saddled him.
He would then put on his Sunday clothes, climb into the saddle, and
canter up the road to the church, just about at the time when the
opening song would start. The crowd would line up to watch him put
his horse through its gaits as he passed the church on his way to
the hitching tree. At the end of services, he would mount his steed
and prance back past the crowd. His cousin, E. J., once remarked,
"He sure loved to ride his horse, and would walk a mile to ride a
half."
As a boy, Tivis attended Sulphur Springs school on Frying Pan Creek.
One fall, when he was home on a short vacation from medical school,
he visited his old school, and, as was customary, he was asked to
address the students. In a brief, friendly discourse, he expressed
his pleasure at being back at his old school and at being with the
youngsters. He then proceeded to give them some advice as to how to
become better citizens, stressing their need to avoid the use of tobacco,
alcohol, and profane language. At this point, he noticed that some
boys were giggling on the back seats. Pointing his finger at them
in pretended anger, he said: "Boys, I know why you are laughing. What
I am saying to you is 'Do as I say - not as I do.'"
After completing his local schooling, Tivis attended a normal school
in Fountain City, TN. Upon completion of his work there, he taught
school in Dickenson County and turned down an offer of a job as principal
in Hominy, OK. It was during this time that he was involved in one
of his last boyish episodes before he turned to more serious work.
Timber operators were cutting great quantities of poplar logs, which
they floated down Frying Pan Creek, through the Breaks of the Cumberlands,
and into Kentucky where they were sawed into lumber at mills on the
Big Sandy and the Ohio. The floating was done when the streams were
swollen with rains and snows in the springtime. Some of the more adventurous
boys liked to jump onto the floating logs and see how long they could
ride them. One March day, Tivis' cousin, Kilgore Sutherland, was visiting
him. The spring tide was on, and long lines of poplar logs were whirling
down the Frying Pan. In search of excitement, the boys dared one another
to a contest in log-riding. They jumped on separate logs and rode
them far downstream. As they turned a curve, they saw that other logs
had become jammed at a narrow place in the creek ahead of them, piling
up for a hundred yards or more upstream. As they approached the log
jam, Kilgore jumped off his log, but Tivis decided to win the contest
by riding into the jam. He was soon knocked off his log by the impact
of colliding logs and was pulled under the log-jam in deep water.
In a short time, however, his head popped up in the mass of logs fifty
feet below the middle of the jam. In his excitement and great relief,
Kilgore could think of only one thing to say: "Tiv where's y'r hat?"
In 1903, an uncle, Noah T. Counts, began study at the Medical College
of Virginia as did a cousin, Jesse Columbus Sutherland. Their experiences
inspired Tivis, who returned with them to medical school the following
year. When Tivis completed medical school the following year, he returned
to Frying Pan where he purchased a horse for $180 and opened an office.
His first patient was his cousin, Lee Sutherland, of Tiny. Tiv's father
had died in 1906, and his son assumed the responsibility of supporting
the family, which included sending his younger brother, Hoge, through
high school and college. The young doctor remained in that small,
isolated community for eleven years, gaining a reputation for his
ability to treat typhoid fever successfully and for his skill in handling
difficult obstetric cases.
Mr. Ralph Rasnick, on the staff of the Coalfield Progress, summed
up Dr. Sutherland's early practice: Years later Doc recalled that
there were no regular fees scheduled in those early years. Labor cases
were $5 and, after a number of years, went up to $10. Office calls
were 50 cents to $1. He usually charged 25 cents a mile for travel
on horseback or on foot. When he went to a home on a call, he charged
very little other than mileage.
He rode on horseback for a dozen years before he bought a T-Model
Ford, although he often remarked that it was of little use to him
since there were no roads. He complained that there was no hospital
within fifty miles and no way to get to it if there had been one.
He married Emma Burns Yates, a Dickenson County teacher, in 1911,
and he gave her most of the credit for whatever success he had. Often
his calls meant fording swollen streams in bitterly cold weather and
he would return home with his feet frozen in the stirrups. His wife
would be waiting with a hammer to break the ice and free him.
"It never made any difference about money," Dr. Sutherland said, in
reminiscing about the rewards of practicing medicine. He would accept
anything as payment including hams, potatoes, molasses, or, quite
often, nothing at all. In fact, one man came to him and told him that
he wanted to pay for his own delivery. His folks had never had any
money, and the doctor had delivered eleven babies at their house.
The man insisted upon paying the debt even though it was thirty years
late.
A versatile man, Dr. Sutherland always carried a pair of pliers in
his saddlebags in case someone needed a tooth extracted. "I guess
I pulled a washtub full," he once estimated. The bulk of his practice,
however, consisted of delivering babies. Although a fire destroyed
all his office records in 1934, he estimated in 1948 that he had "caught
over 6000 babies," and had averaged about 150 a year.
Although the doctor was generally welcome everywhere, as is indicated
by the singular f act he did not find it necessary to carry a gun,
he was shown no special favor on at least one occasion. Speeding down
the road to make a call, he chanced to run over an old hen. Not only
did he suffer damage when one of the fractured bones pierced his tire,
but the indignant owner - apparently a formidable old lady - insisted
that he pay her two dollars for the dead chicken, an exorbitant price
in those days.
On one of the doctor's many labor cases, he arrived at the home of
a couple who already had seven boys and were hoping that the eighth
one would be a girl. When the tired, exhausted mother asked, after
the ordeal was over, if the new baby was a girl, he was forced to
tell her that their eighth boy had just been born. The mother wailed
in disappointment, "Now Doc, y'know I didn't want nary other boy!"
"Wel-l-l," said Doc, "D'y want me t' put it back?"
"Lord've mercy, no!" she cried.
Dr. Sutherland was constantly active and, during the days of the party
line telephone, the whole community kept up with his location at any
given time. He worked alone in his office at first, but later hired
nurses to assist him. These included Mrs. Marie Lester, Mrs. Dolly
Rose, and Mrs. Clara Coleman. After the family moved to Haysi, many
of the children of friends and relatives lived with the Sutherlands
in order to take advantage of the high school. The most that was required
of them was to help Mrs. Sutherland with the milking, feeding of stock,
gardening, and household chores. For many years after they moved to
town, Mrs. Sutherland kept her cows and chickens, and, until the year
of her death, there was always a large vegetable garden with truck
patches.
The Sutherlands had six children of their own. The eldest, Ayers,
was unmarried and remained his mother's constant companion from the
time his father died in 1960 until his own sudden death five years
later. The second son, Joshua Price, received his medical degree from
his father's alma mater just in time to be called into the service
of his country in World War II. He was a captain and a surgeon in
the 106th Infantry Division in 1943. When von Rumstedt broke through
the allied lines into Belgium in December, 1944, he was taken to a
German prison, where he was praised for his heroic service to both
comrades and foes alike. He was liberated some weeks later. After
the war he returned home to become the head physician for the Harman
Coal Company near Grundy and now owns and operates the Sutherland
Clinic in that town.
The third son, Tivis Colley Sutherland, Jr., also served overseas
in World War II. He attended Emory and Henry College and now assists
his brother at the Sutherland Clinic. The older daughter, Mrs. Ruth
Watkins, has served as a teacher and as a public welfare supervisor
in Lee and Buchanan Counties. She is active in club and church work
and is a member of the Buchanan First Presbyterian Church, the Order
of the Eastern Star, the Historical Society of Southwest Virginia,
and the Lovelady Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution.
The younger daughter, Blanche, is now Mrs. Almer Arrington of Abingdon.
Before her marriage, she was an accomplished bookkeeper and accountant.
Together with Dr. A. S. Richardson of Grundy, Dr. Sutherland helped
form the Buchanan-Dickenson County Medical Association in 1932, and
served as president and secretary of the organization. In 1935, he
fought a tireless battle which culminated in the establishment of
the first public health department in Dickenson County. He also fought
to have the town of Haysi incorporated and afterward served many terms
as councilman. He also served some years on the School Electoral Board
of Dickenson County. Other successful undertakings in which he had
a part were the moves to establish the Breaks Interstate Park and
to build the road down the McClure River. He was a large stockholder
in the Old Cumberland Bank and Trust Company, and president of the
Dickenson County Diamond Jubilee Association in 1955. He was a member
of the Sandy Valley Masonic Lodge of Grundy and of the Kazim Temple
of Roanoke; a charter member and director of the Haysi Kiwanis Club
organized in 1949; and a member of the Haysi Church of Christ.
At the meeting of the Virginia Medical Association in October, 1958,
Dr. Sutherland was named the "General Practitioner of the Year" in
recognition of his fifty years of faithful medical service. On November
23, 1958 Doctor Tiv, was honored by the people he had served in this
rugged hill country for half a century. More than 800 people turned
out to pay homage to the man who had doctored their ills, delivered
their babies, and offered them love and counsel since 1908. Many of
those included three generations of men and women he had ushered into
the world.
Doctor Tiv, nearing his 79th birthday, was caught completely by surprise
at the "This is your Life" program planned for him, just as he was
when he received the state-wide honor by his fellow physicians. It
was with tears in his eyes and his unusual smile that Dr. Sutherland
greeted relatives and friends who came forward as living testimonies
of their love and respect for him. Among the program participants
was Mrs. Emma Barton of nearby Bee, VA, who interrupted Doctor Tiv's
wedding night back in 1911 when she chose that night to be born. Another
participant was Mrs. Betty Pauly of Detroit, who brought along her
month old daughter, both delivered by Dr. Sutherland.
All his children and grandchildren were announced, and they greeted
him and Mrs. Sutherland on the stage of the Haysi High School Building.
Then came old friends and relatives who had boarded in their home
to teach or attend high school; and a pioneer minister, the Rev. T.
K. Mowbray, who shared the comfort and hospitality of the Sutherland
home while he was establishing the Dickenson First Presbyterian Church.
After Mr. Mowbray, who had come from South Carolina, there appeared
another surprise visitor for the occasion - the Rev. Neil McKinnon,
a Methodist minister of Clintwood, who had also stayed at the Sutherland
home on occasions, and who hilariously described the way in which
he came over to Haysi and baptized Mr. Mowbray's new Presbyterian
converts by immersion. Since he was a Methodist, the members largely
former Baptists who wished to join the Presbyterian Church, the Rev.
McKinnon said that he still had not figured out exactly what those
he baptized were.
County officials, school authorities, members of the Legislature,
state senators, and Ninth District Congressman, Mr. W. Pat Jennings,
all came to pay tribute. The ladies of the community served lunch
to the hundreds of people who attended the ceremony that was presented
by Mr. Glen Kiser.
Messages and awards flooded in from all over the nation: the certificate
of recognition presented by the Medical Society of Virginia to Doctor
Sutherland; a certificate of appreciation and recognition, signed
by the President of the United States, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and the
Governor of Virginia, J. Lindsey Almond, Jr.; a letter of congratulation
from Congressman W. Pat Jennings; also congratulations from the district
governor of the Kiwanis International; an article in the Commonwealth
"Virginians in the Public Eye", also letters from Mr. & Mrs. W. West
of Fincastle, VA; Allen D. Crutchfield of Richmond, VA, Tivis D. Owens,
Attorney, of Richlands, VA; Dr. G. D. Vermilya, of Clinch Valley Clinic
Hospital; Dr. Frank S. Givens of Roanoke; and a most interesting personal
letter from Dr. Sutherland's younger brother, Mr. J. H. T. Sutherland,
which was written to his nephew, Dr. Joshua P. Sutherland of Grundy.
In the course of this program the late Dr. Williams of Richlands appeared
on the stage and told how he and Dr. Sutherland once performed a leg
amputation on a dining table.
Dr. Sutherland was one who seldom complained or spoke of his own troubles.
However, in 1959 it became evident that his health was failing. During
1960 he agreed to go to Charlottesville for extensive tests, and eventual
surgery.
Later he returned to his home in Haysi, and it soon became evident
that the courageous old soldier was fighting a losing battle. He passed
away on October 21, 1960 at his home, with his beloved Emma and his
children by his bedside.
His funeral service on October 23, 1960, was conducted at the Haysi
Church of Christ, and was attended by more than a thousand people,
many of whom were unable to enter the church except to file past his
casket with tearful eyes. So vast was the procession that cars were
parked from lower Main Street most of the way to the northern Haysi
corporate limits. The great array of floral tributes filled the church
altar and overflowed to the windows and walls. Honorary pall bearers
were from his own medical profession and business associates. He was
buried on the hill overlooking the town of Haysi that he loved so
well.
Besides his widow and five children, he was survived by his sister,
Mrs. May Owens, of Tiny, Dickenson Co., VA; his brother, J. H. T.
Sutherland, (who passed away in February, 1970); eleven grandchildren;
and a host of relatives and friends. I cannot think of a more fitting
way in which to close the life story of this great Southwest Virginian
than to quote from my own feature article in the Bristol Herald Courier
in 1948, the fortieth year of his medical practice:
Dr. Sutherland has lived perhaps a more interesting life than many
other individuals combined, but he was too busy to capitalize on it.
He endured long hours of weariness and loss of sleep. He faced danger
in the forms of disease, flood, ice, snow, sub-zero weather, and traffic
risks, but none seemed to alarm or ruffle him. His calmness, cheerfulness,
and generosity were his stepping stones to fast friendships and success.
Much has been said of the feats of gunmen of the Cumberland ranges
who destroyed life, but far too little is told of those brave souls
who escorted and saved the lives of a veritable forest of grateful
people.
Pages 1 to 17 Of Historical Society of Southwest Virginia's Sketches
1972