John L. Stillwell was born in Seoul South Korea in July of 1962. His mother was also from South Korea, but his father was a chemist for Grace Corporation. So, his family moved all over the United States until finally settling and making Belfast, Maine their home in the Fall of 1970. There John would finish High School in June of 1980. 

Shortly after, in November of 1980, John decided to relocate to Tampa, Florida where he was hired by Heidt & Associates, Inc. as a Rodman on one of their many Field Crews. Over the next few years, he progressed to Instrument Man and eventually to a Party Chief.

There didn’t seem to be anything that John couldn’t do in the field. In many cases he would work on some of the “High Profile” Projects in the company at the time. So, his experience in the field is quite extensive.

In May of 1985, John was promoted into the office at Heidt & Associates, Inc. to be involved with the many Florida Department of Transportation (F.D.O.T.) projects that were going on at the time. It was there that he learned AutoCAD Drafting and the Art of Surveying and the judgements that go into it.

John eventually was transferred to the Subdivision Layout & Plat Department where he joined forces with Arthur W. Merritt and Vicky Robinson to fine tune his skills at Drafting, Writing Legal Descriptions, tracing Title Work, and learning the art of computing Subdivision Layouts and Platting. In April of 1992 John left Heidt & Associates, Inc.

John would go on to work for EMK, and then to Echezabal & Associates, Inc., in the Tampa Bay area, doing field and office work on a vast majority of F.D.O.T. Projects. He then joined forces, in February of 1998, with Dan Van Horn to open their own Surveying Company, “Stillwell, Van Horn & Associates, Inc.”. Unfortunately, that venture closed in March 2000. So, John returned back to work in the Survey Department at Heidt & Associates, Inc., a coming back home of sorts. 

While working in the Survey Department at Heidt & Associates, Inc., John became a Florida Professional Surveyor & Mapper, No. LS6593, on March 29, 2007. He worked there until March 2008. Heidt & Associates, Inc. would finally close its doors in late 2009.

John went on to work at Universal Pegasus International, an Energy Business, from April 2008 to August 2017, during the financial down turn of our country until finally, in September of 2017, happily reuniting with Art & Vicky at AMERRITT, INC.