Patron of the Atrs
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In 2001, the James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation made a lead gift of $1.5 million to the project. In 2005, the Oregon Legislature approved $3.95 million in general obligation bonds, which the university was required to match. More than 150 donors have also contributed to the complex, including Gwen Lillis, whose $150,000 gift will name the facility’s new costume shop.
James Miller began his career at age sixteen as an office boy at Blyth & Company Investments in Portland, and eventually became president of the company’s New York office. He and his wife, Marion, returned to Portland in 1996, where they continued their philanthropic support of education and the arts. He died June 3, 2004, at age ninety-nine.
“James Miller was a true patron of the arts,” said Portland businessman Chuck Putney, who is president of the James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation. “He was an avid supporter of dance, music, the visual arts and, of course, theater. He also supported education. This project embodies perfectly this philanthropic commitment to both the arts and scholarship.”
“To know Jimmy Miller was to like him enormously,” said UO President Dave Frohnmayer. “He had a deep love for the arts. He achieved what he did entirely from his own brainpower. He didn’t have the benefit of a college education, but he always appreciated the importance of higher education.”
