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Draft:Peter Miller

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Peter Mitchell Miller (b. 1934) is an American photographer, author, publisher and journalist.

Miller is best known for his photographs of rural Americans. He has self-published books of his photographs with his own commentary: Vermont People, Vermont Farm Women, People of the Great Plains. Nothing Hardly Ever Happens in Colbyville, Vermont, A Lifetime of Vermont People, and Vanishing Vermonters: The Loss of a Rural Culture. Other books he has written are The 30,000 Mile Ski Race, The Skier’s Almanac, The Photographer’s Almanac, and The First Time I Saw Paris.During his long career Miller has taken photographs of Paris in the 1950s, the grape harvest in Margaux (France), Dachau, Rahjastan, the Atacama Desert,ski racing, and the World Trade Towers. In 1997 he published a selection of his Paris photographs, The First Time I Saw Paris. His esteemed teacher, Yousuf Karsh, said of the book: "With poetic eloquence borne of mature reflection, Peter Miller nostalgically re-examines his youthful photographic love affair with post-World War II Paris, and we share the thrill of discovery as his perceptive lens captures the timeless spirit of a generation."

Early life and education

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Miller was born on January 6, 1934, at Doctors Hospital in Manhattan. He spent his early life in New Jersey and Connecticut. After his parents divorced, his mother decided to move with he and his brother and sister to Weston, Vermont, where he soon found his love for hunting, fishing, and skiing. When he was in high school, several rifles were stolen from his home in Weston and with the $160 in insurance money his mother gave him he bought a twin-lens reflex camera.

Miller spent much of his time afterward walking the fields around Weston where he met the local farmers. “I liked the farmers,” he said. “They were the first people I met.” [1] He was completely self-taught as a photographer as there was no one around who was interested in photography except one man in Manchester Village who had a studio where Miller often had his prints developed.

Miller received his B.A. in literature from the University of Toronto. While in Toronto, Miller became an apprentice for the world-famous photographer Yousuf Karsh, the premier portrait photographer in the world. In 1954 Miller spent three months with Karsh in Europe photographing the leading intellectuals of the day, including Picasso, Albert Camus, Pablo Casals, and the future Pope John XXIII.

Early Career

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After graduating in 1955, Miller enlisted in the U.S. Army and became a Signal Corps photographer. He was assigned to Paris where he photographed French and American generals, public relations stories, and crime scenes.When he completed his tour of duty in 1958, Miller worked in New York City as a reporter for Life magazine, the first all-photography U.S. news magazine, then selling 13 million copies a year. As a reporter, he was not allowed to take photos while on assignment. However, the job gave him an opportunity to learn how to write and how a magazine was put together.

Photographer, Publisher and Author An avid skier, in 1964 Miller returned to Vermont to start his own ski magazine Vermont Skiing, which folded during the recession of 1968. From 1969-1990, he was a contributing editor and photographer for Ski magazine, based in New York City. In 1981 he also worked as a freelance photographer and writer and became a stock photographer for the Image Bank, Iconica, and photo stock agencies in Europe and Asia.

In 1990 Miller returned to Vermont and established Silver Print Press to publish his photographs of rural Vermonters, mortgaging his house to do so as he could not find a publisher. Vermont People, People of the Great Plains, Vermont Farm Women, Vermont Gathering Places, A Lifetime of Vermont People, and Vanishing Vermonters were all published by Silver Print Press.

Miller also ghosted and provided photographs for Larry Benoit’s classic book, How to Bag the Biggest Buck of Your Life, the most famous hunting book on the lore of tracking the big ones. His book Hardly Anything Happens in Colbyville, Vermont is an anthology of twenty-seven stories written or edited by Miller about his hometown of Colbyville and nearby Stowe, which includes a sad account of fishing and Viet Nam, but also a hilarious story of a flea attack.

Following publication of Vermont Farm Women, Miller set up the Vermont Farm Women’s Fund and donated part of the proceeds from the sale of his book to the fund. In 2006 he was the first author and photographer to be named Vermonter of the Year by the Burlington Free Press and the Vermont state legislature. Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy gave a speech on the Senate floor about Peter Miller’s work documenting over a half a century of rural Vermont. His photographs have been exhibited in one-man shows in New York, Oklahoma, Paris, and Tokyo, and are on display in his gallery in Colbyville, Vermont,and on his virtual gallery called Off the Wall on his Website.

Publications The 30,000 Mile Ski Race (Dial Press, 1973) The Skier's Almanac (Nick Lyons Press and Doubleday, 1980) The Photographer's Almanac (Little Brown, 1982) Vermont People (Silver Print Press, 1990) People of the Great Plains (Silver Print Press, 1996) The First Time I Saw Paris (Times Books/Random House, 1999). Published in France as Paris Perdu et Retrouvé, Photographies et souvenirs de la Ville Lumière (Paris, 2001) Vermont Farm Women (Silver Print Press, 2002) Vermont People (Silver Print Press. Revised edition, seventh printing, 2003) Vermont Gathering Places (Silver Print Press, 2005) Nothing Hardly Ever Happens in Colbyville, Vermont (Silver Print Press, 2008) A Lifetime of Vermont People (Silver Print Press, 2013) Vanishing Vermonters: Loss of a Rural Culture (Silver Print Press, 2017)

Awards Lifetime Achievement in Ski Journalism The Image Bank Award for Visual Excellence IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award for People of the Great Plains IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award for Vermont Farm Women Independent Publisher’s Award for Vermont Farm Women Vermonter of the Year 2006 from the Vermont State Legislature New England Society in the City of New York Gold Award for A Lifetime of Vermont People Paul Robbins Journalism Award for ski writing and photography from the Vermont Ski and Snowboard Museum

Books

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  • Vermont People
  • Vermont Farm Women
  • People of the Great Plains
  • Nothing Hardly Ever Happens in Colbyville, Vermont, A Lifetime of Vermont People,
  • Vanishing Vermonters: The Loss of a Rural Culture
  • The 30,000 Mile Ski Race
  • The Skier’s Almanac
  • The Photographer’s Almanac
  • The First Time I Saw Paris

External Links Peter Miller official website: www.petermillerphotography.com

References

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A Lifetime of Vermont People: 2014 NES Book Award Winner http://www.nesnyc.org/a-lifetime-of-vermont-people Photographer Peter Miller Becomes Airbnb Host November 4, 2015 https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/photographer-peter-miller-becomes-airbnb-host/Content?oid=2989595

Peter Miller Is Still Here | The Yankee Interview, October 24, 2017 Vermont writer and photographer Peter Miller is at it again, with a new book that both honors his home state and captures a side of it that he fears we may be losing. https://newengland.com/yankee-magazine/living/profiles/peter-miller-is-still-here-the-yankee-interview/

Peter Miller seeks to preserve ‘vanishing Vermonters’ December 10, 2017 https://vtdigger.org/2017/12/10/peter-miller-seeks-preserve-vanishing-vermonters/

Vermont photographer Peter Miller visits Manchester library tonight, March 20, 2018 https://www.benningtonbanner.com/archives/vermont-photographer-peter-miller-visits-manchester-library-tonight/article_1c19c89a-5fea-5b3a-833f-3fcce1f99c33.html

Book Marks: Vermont's vanishing legacy, in words and pictures, March 30, 2018 https://www.reformer.com/local-news/book-marks-vermonts-vanishing-legacy-in-words-and-pictures/article_395e4c65-ccf8-51b3-9dea-a2afe8f454c6.html

Photographer Peter Miller Offers Visual Vignettes into Rural Lives, March 14, 2019 http://www.northstarmonthly.com/profiles/photographer-peter-miller-offers-visual-vignettes-into-rural-lives/article_3db301f0-494e-11e8-9db7-c3f8ea4bcf88.html

Author-photographer Peter Miller speaks at Stowe library, July 19, 2019 https://www.vtcng.com/stowe_reporter/community/author-photographer-peter-miller-speaks-at-stowe-library/article_44d4239c-a97e-11e9-b2f7-e30b84c067c9.html

Longtime writer-photographer looking to pull up local stakes, November 14, 2019 https://www.vtcng.com/waterbury_record/news/local_news/longtime-writer-photographer-looking-to-pull-up-local-stakes/article_200e03e6-06fa-11ea-a74b-577a5b6e4016.html