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Fred Tuttle, 84, Farmer and Celebrity, Dies
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Candidate
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| Contributor | Craverguy |
| Last Edited | Craverguy Feb 14, 2009 07:02am |
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| Category | Obituary |
| News Date | Tuesday, October 7, 2003 06:00:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | Fred Tuttle, a Vermont dairy farmer who in his late 70's won fame far beyond his fields by starring in a cult movie and winning the Republican nomination for United States Senate, died on Saturday. He was 84.
Mr. Tuttle died of a heart attack on the same farm in Tunbridge, Vt., where he was born, his son Christopher said.
In 1998, Mr. Tuttle -- known for his almost impenetrable New England accent (''ahyep''), farmer's overalls and a baseball cap that said Fred -- startled nearly everyone by handily winning the Republican primary and then doing more than respectably in the general election, losing to the incumbent Democratic senator, Patrick J. Leahy. He won nine towns even after asking Vermonters to vote for Mr. Leahy.
Mr. Tuttle's political career, at first a pure publicity stunt, sprang from playing the role of Fred Herman Tuttle -- a familiar one, considering that he was born with this name on July 18, 1919 -- in the 1996 film ''Man With a Plan.''
It was directed by John O'Brien, a Harvard-educated sheep farmer who was Mr. Tuttle's neighbor, and told the story of a down-and-out dairy farmer who is sick and broke and realizes that being elected to Congress could solve a lot of his problems. What other job would pay $129,000 to a 10th-grade dropout?
The fictional Fred delivers lines like this: ''I spent all my time in the barn. I'd just like to spend a little time in the House.''
The movie makes wicked fun of today's politics. Since it is Vermont, Fred kisses cows as well as babies. He gets contributions from a PAC -- of the Cub Scout variety, not a political action committee, $16.89 to be exact. He feels he has arrived when the opposition begins scouring his past for a sexual scandal.
But in an interview yesterday, Mr. O'Brien suggested that it had been Mr. Tuttle's personality -- ''exhausted, introverted, sly, all in one'' -- that made the movie and the subsequent campaign work. |
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