Dr. Grace Honora Sharp Thille
A true pioneer in Ventura County CA in both medicine and in Ranching
Birth: Sep. 5, 1875 Ventura County California,
Death: May 27, 1979 Ventura County California, USA
Obituary:
Note: The information provided is as of May 27, 1979
Dr. Grace Honora Sharp Thille,
103, whose life spanned nearly the whole history of Ventura County and who became a physician at the time when almost no women were in that profession, died Sunday. Death came at the historic family home on Telegraph
Road between Santa Paula and Ventura, where she had lived almost all her life.
The Victorian mansion was built in 1890. She had outlived all her contemporaries and the only survivors, according to a spokesman for the Skillin-Snyder Funeral Home, are nieces and nephews.
Dr. Grace, as she was known to so many, was born Sept. 5, 1875, near Santa Rosa. She was the eldest of eight children of a hard-working but impecunious farmer, James Meikle Sharp.
The family moved to Oregon when she was one and to the Santa Clara Valley in 1887. Ventura County was just
five years old.She was the brightest student at Santa Paula High School, and early on had her eye on a medical career. She attended both Stanford and the University of California at Berkeley, then graduated from Cooper Medical College at San Francisco in 1899. This institution was the forerunner of Stanford University Medical School.
She was licensed on her 24th birthday in 1899, the last year medical licenses were granted without examination in
California. Only one other woman had become a licensed physician up to that time.
An epidemic of tuberculosis swept the Bay Area, and in particular the medical school: “The epidemic killed nearly all the students I graduated with,” she said. “It almost killed me, too, but I went up into the hills and fought it.”
She practiced in the Santa Paula area, but only for about five years. “Only one patient gave me any money during that five years,” she told a reporter many years later. “One man used to give me $50 gold pieces to take care of his
daughter. He was a good man.” Another man, she said, had threatened her and she took along a gun in her buggy. When he tried to grab the reins of her horse she produced the weapon and “he galloped off like a streak.”
On another occasion, she was delivering a baby when the coal oil lamp sputtered out and the room was plunged into darkness. She had to interrupt the delivery to locate a lantern on the back porch. She found that bookkeeping paid better than medicine. “I earned about $300 from different companies,” she recalled. “That was a lot of money then. Much more than I ever got as a doctor.”
When an aunt died, she was thrust into raising four nephews and nieces. One of those was rancher James Sharp. Grace had never married. She almost did at 25, she once said, “but the fella told me a lie, so that put him off the map.” What the lie was went unrevealed.Then, at age 50, she married John Peter Thille, whose family had come to the Santa Clara Valley in 1890. He was seven years her junior and had never been married either. A man who knew poverty in his youth, Mr. Thille became a highly successful farmer and businessman as well as Santa Paula’s pioneer aviator, and founder of the Santa Paula Aero Club. The marriage lasted 47 years until Mr. Thille’s death in
1971 at the age of 87. There were no children.
As the Thilles prospered, they gave to many causes. In 1959 the family made a $350,000 donation to start
construction of Santa Paula Memorial Hospital. They also made donations to St. Joseph’s Convalescent Home and Villanova Preparatory School in the Ojai Valley and donated the property on which Sacred Heart Catholic Church is located. The Crippled Children’s Society and the Ventura County Symphony were other beneficiaries of their generosity, along with many unpublicized donations.
Dr. Grace, a tiny slip of a woman, hardly ever talked about these gifts publicly. “I hate publicity,” she said on many occasions. The Thilles were honored by their church in 1967 when James Francis Cardinal McIntyre presented papal honors to both. Dr. Grace received the Papal Cross and her husband the Order of Knighthood of St. Gregory. Being a Catholic didn’t prevent Dr. Grace from playing the organ at the Santa Paula Presbyterian Church
Burial:Pierce Brothers Santa Paula Cemetery Santa
Paula Ventura County, CA Find A Grave Memorial#
80610830
Article from local Newspaper:
100-Year Tribute : Pioneers: The California Women for Agriculture will honor three farm families for their century of community contributions.
Three Ventura County families who
have farmed in the area for more than 100 years will be honored in Saticoy tonight for their contributions to the county. James Meikle Sharp began farming in Saticoy in 1876. Rudolph E. Haase arrived in Bardsdale in 1888. And Battista Vanoni settled in the Conejo Valley in 1889. Their families are being honored by California Women for Agriculture for
their contributions both to agriculture and to community life over the past century, said Robin Dick, chairwoman of tonight’s tribute.
The three families were instrumental in the development of the county’s agricultural industry, said Alberta Word,former librarian at the Ventura County Historical Society Museum and now reference librarian at Foster Library. “All three
were extremely active families who took the lead in projects in Ventura County and did what needed to be done to improve agriculture here,” Word said.
James Sharp, an Ohio-born and educated man who crossed the country by oxcart, settled with his wife and son in the county at age 32 as a part-time schoolteacher and full-time farmer. He planted lima beans and walnuts and later added lemons and oranges. Sharp soon founded and became the first president of the now defunct Saticoy Walnut Growers Association.
His daughter, Grace, became the county’s first woman physician in 1899. She donated her medical services for about five years until she quit her practice “on account of the night work,” she wrote in a 1958 book called “Yesterday.”
Dr. Grace, as she was known, and husband John Thille, whom she married at age 50, donated money to begin
construction of Santa Paula Memorial Hospital. They also contributed to the Catholic Church and Villanova Preparatory School in the Ojai Valley. The Thilles moved into the large Victorian Sharp family house on Telegraph Road
when Grace Sharp Thille’s parents died. They had no children of their own but raised the four children of a brother whose wife had died.