Stanford Lee Warren was born in 1863 in Caswell County, North Carolina. Warren relocated to Durham, North Carolina in his youth, taking up a job as a shipping clerk in the Bull Durham Tobacco company. He later attended and graduated from Leonard Medical School, and he quickly grew into a prominent and influential physician and businessman in Durham. For a time, he served as vice president of Mechanics and Farmers Bank as well as vice president and treasurer of Peoples Drug Store, Inc. Warren died in Durham on January 31, 1940.