His paternal grandfather Niels Truedsson (1847–1921) left Scania in Sweden in the 1870s and came to the United States via Germany, settling in Blair, Nebraska with his surname anglicized as Truhlsen.

He kept the Berkshire stocks when Warren Buffett liquidated the partnership in 1969 [6] In 1983, Truhlsen became president of the American Academy of Ophthalmology with which he had been associated since 1951, when he had returned to Omaha from a residency at Barnes Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine.

The Nebraska Affiliate of the National Society to Prevent Blindness gave him its People of Vision Award in 1986.

While he was a governor of the American College of Surgeons in 1985, Truhlsen's home state elected him to the honorary position of King of Quivira as Ak-Sar-Ben XCI.

[7] His first connection with Ak-Sar-Ben was in his childhood when his father had served as an ambassador of the organization and brought Truhlsen and his young friends to Omaha for its events for boys.

The University of Nebraska College of Medical Alumni gave Stanley M. Truhlsen Sr. its first Distinguished Alumnus Achievement Award in 1989.