Career
He batted and threw right-handed and also played third base for a brief period in 1961. On practically every baseball card issued for Tuttle, a large bulge of chewing tobacco is evident in his cheek. Tuttle died in Anoka, Minnesota at the age of 69, and oral cancer was in all likelihood the cause of his death.
Bill was diagnosed with oral cancer five years before his death, and he put the last half-decade of his life to use in raising awareness, as an active volunteer for the National Spit Tobacco Education Program (NSTEP) of Oral Health America.
During the last years of his life, Tuttle was facially disfigured due to extensive surgery for oral cancer. He traveled widely as a public speaker, warning major league players of the dangers of chewing tobacco.
"lieutenant"s going to be pretty hard to tell someone making $4 million a year not to chew", he admitted. "So what we"re trying to do is get it off television" What Tuttle was trying to do was to stop baseball players from chewing tobacco, and thus setting a bad example for the young people who watch baseball.
After being diagnosed with oral cancer, he was interviewed for a Reader"s Digest article entitled "My War With A Smoke Free Killer" in which he detailed how he was introduced to chewing tobacco by a teammate while sidelined with an injury and subsequently became addicted.
The article made it a point to show pictures of a disfigured Tuttle after his many facial surgeries. He died in July 1998 at age 69. After attending Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, he played in his first major league game on September 10, 1952.
In his 11-year career, Tuttle had a.259 batting average, with 67 home runs and 443 RBIs.
He had 1,105 career hits before retiring on May 11, 1963. Throughout his career, Tuttle was considered one of the most reliable outfielders in the game, leading the league in putouts in 1955 and 1960 and outfield assists in 1959 and 1960.