Stephen J. W. Tabor was born on August 5, 1815, in Corinth, Vermont, to Stephen Tabor. His mother died around 1823, and his father died around 1826. He attended school in Bradford, Vermont, and he reportedly spent “every spare moment…in the public and private libraries to which he could gain access.” He began working as a teacher, and he reportedly “published a work translated from the French.” He moved to New York City, and he “obtained a position on the editorial corps of the Beacon.”

 

He moved to Ashfield, Massachusetts, around 1837, and he studied medicine with Dr. Charles Knowlton. He graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1840, and he began working as a physician. He married Melvinia Lucy Knowlton—his mentor’s daughter—on May 2, 1843, but she died on August 11, 1845. He then married Mary Ann Sherman on March 29, 1847, and they had at least three children: Stephen, born around 1849; Eunice, born around 1855; and Anna, born around 1867. He moved to Shelburne, Massachusetts, in the 1840s. He supported the Democratic Party, and he joined the Free Soil movement in 1848. One acquaintance remembered him as “one of the finest political speakers of his generation.”

 

He moved to Independence, Iowa, around 1855, and he worked as a newspaper editor. He was elected county judge soon afterward, and he later served as county treasurer and recorder. In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln appointed him Fourth Auditor in the Treasury Department. He resigned from the position in 1878 and returned to Independence. By 1880, he was working as a druggist. He died in Independence on May 10, 1883.

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