STILES, TRUMAN Ransom, M. D. There are very few physicians
in Vermont who are as widely and favorably known in both the public and
professional capacity as Dr. T. R. STILES, for his practice has covered
a wide range in Caledonia county, and he has held many important public
positions. His parents were James W. and Hannah A. (HOWE) STILES, long-time
residents of Stowe, Vermont, where the subject of this sketch was born,
in 1847. After attending the High school of his native village, at seventeen
years of age he became a clerk in a drug store at Waterbury, Vermont, where
he remained three years, and began reading medicine with Dr. Horace FALES.
He continued his medical studies with Dr. B. F. SUTTON of Stowe,
and graduated from the medical department of U. V. M. in 1869.
Later he took brief post-graduate courses, and during the winter
of 1901 took the full course at the post-graduate school of New York City.
In the fall of 1869 he settled in Sheffield, and after a residence of ten
years removed to Barnet, where he remained seven years, attending at both
places to an extensive practice.
He was already well known when he came to St. Johnsbury in 1887,
where he has continued in active practice until the present, and was for
several years proprietor of a drug store.
Dr. STILES has been a member of the United States pension board
of Caledonia county continuously for twenty years, except a period of four
or five years during the administration of President Cleveland, most of
the time as secretary or acting secretary, and during the past six years
as president.
He has been a director and for the past seven years president of
the Caledonia County Agricultural Society, during which period a debt of
more than $3,000 has been raised and the buildings and grounds put in good
condition. He has been village trustee and superintendent of the village
water works and is a director of the Merchants' National bank and a member
of the state board of health.
Dr. STILES is a Mason, an Odd Fellow, and a Knight of Pythias, and
has passed all of the chairs of the local bodies of the two last named
societies.
He was a member of the legislature of 1898 from St. Johnsbury, was
chairman of the committee on public health, and a member on the committee
for the insane. It was largely due to his personal efforts that the bill
providing for the state laboratory was passed and he also presented and
championed the bill providing for the examination of physicians practicing
in the state.
Elected a senator from Caledonia county in 1902, he was chairman
of the committee on public health, a member of several other committees,
drafted several important measures presented by himself and others, and
took an active part in the general discussions of the senate.
Truman R. STILES married Abbie A. JENNESS of Sheffield in 1870.
Their two sons are Don C. (a merchant in the line of druggists' sundries,
patent medicines, and stationery, located on Railroad street) and Ned C.
The latter is a graduate M. D. of U. V. M., of the class of '99; also a
post-graduate of Tufts Medical college, and of the Kline School of Optics
of Boston. Mrs. STILES died in April, 1900.
Dr. STILES married Miss Elizabeth A. DERICK of Sherbrooke in 1901,
and their little daughter is named Charlotte Hilda.
Source: Successful Vermonters,
William H. Jeffrey, E. Burke, Vermont, The Historical Publishing Company,
1904, page 36-38.
Prepared
by Tom Dunn January 2003
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