Departures of note

Fred Tuttle, a retired dairy farmer from Tunbridge, Vermont, became an unexpected political figure in 1998 when he ran for the U.S. Senate as a Republican. His campaign was a tongue-in-cheek publicity stunt to promote the mockumentary film 'Man with a Plan,' in which he starred as a farmer who runs for Congress. Tuttle defeated his opponent, Jack McMullen, in the Republican primary by 5,034 votes, largely due to Vermont's open primary system that allowed Democrats and independents to vote for him. He then announced he had no intention of serving in the Senate and endorsed the incumbent Democrat, Patrick Leahy, who easily won reelection.

Tuttle's life before politics was rooted in rural Vermont. Born in 1919, he attended South Royalton High School but left after the tenth grade to work on his family's dairy farm. He served in the U.S. Army during World War II, participating in military actions in Europe with the Military Police and the Army Corps of Engineers. After the war, he returned to farming, retiring in 1984. His neighbor, filmmaker John O'Brien, recognized Tuttle's charisma and cast him in several films, including 'Nosey Parker' and 'Man with a Plan.'

During the 1998 campaign, Tuttle's humor and local knowledge stood out. In a debate on Vermont Public Radio, he asked McMullen questions like how many teats a Holstein cow has, to which McMullen incorrectly answered 'six' instead of four. Tuttle also made light of his own candidacy, saying he did not want to win because he would have to move to Washington, D.C. Despite endorsing Leahy, Tuttle still received 48,051 votes, about 22 percent of the total, in the general election.

Tuttle died in 2003 at the age of 84, following a heart attack after a day of digging potatoes. He was buried in Tunbridge's Spring Road Cemetery, wearing his overalls, with a pen in his pocket for autograph signing and a can of Moxie by his side. Senator Leahy described him as 'the distilled essence of Vermonthood,' and he remains remembered as a folk figure who used humor to challenge political conventions.