Samuel Henry Miller

January 3, 1915 – December 20, 2000

Samuel Henry Miller, former Durango mayor and longtime business owner, died Wednesday, Dec. 20, 2000, in his home in Louisville, Colo. He was 85.

Born Jan. 3, 1915, in Perry, Oklahoma he was the son of Peter A. and Velma Wren Churchill Miller. He grew up on his father’s farm in Noble County. He served as captain of the ’34 Perry Maroon undefeated football team. Following his graduation from Perry high in 1935, he enrolled at the University of Idaho at Moscow, Idaho. He played on the freshman football squad and pledged the Sigma Chi fraternity.

Mr. Miller moved to the Four Corners in 1937 to work in the oil fields. He met Rosemary Chaney, who was teaching school in Bloomfield, N.M., and they were married in Gallup, New Mexico in 1939. They moved around the area and settled in Uravan, Colo., in 1940. Mr. Miller was a safety engineer at U. S. Vanadium Corporation there.

After Pearl Harbor, Mr. Miller enlisted in the Navy. He was soon drafted into a special combat/construction unit of the Marines to establish air fields on newly captured islands in the South Pacific. He helped build the airstrip on Tinian and watched the Enola Gay take off and return, while knowing nothing of its mission at the time.

After the war, Mr. and Mrs. Miller moved back to the Durango area and built the Spanish Trails Motel in 1946 in what was then Animas City. They were members of the Durango Motel Owners Association and the Durango Chamber of Commerce. They sold the motel and retired in 1983. They moved to Louisville in September 1995.

Mr. Miller was actively involved in the Durango community. He was instrumental in the merger between Animas City and Durango in 1948, when he first became a Durango city councilor.

He served on the council from 1948-1953 and was the mayor of Durango from 1949-50. Mr. Miller was a La Plata County commissioner from 1954-1960.

Preceding him in death was an infant son, Sammie in 1954.

Survivors include: his wife, Rosemary; two children, Colleen of Louisville, Colo., and Matt of Ithaca, N.Y.; five grandchildren; a sister, Marie and a brother, Gerald, both from Arkansas City, Kan.; and six nieces and nephews.

There will be no funeral, but there will be a memorial service in Durango this spring.