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Peter 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 three-award winning books of these photographs with his own commentary: Vermont People, Vermont Farm Women, and People of the Plains.

During his long career he also took photographs of Paris in the 1950s, the grape harvest in Margaux, France, Dachau, ski racing, and the World Trade Towers. In 1997 he published a selection of his Paris photographs, The First Time I Saw Paris.

Early Life and Education

Born in New York City, Miller spent his early life in New Jersey and Connecticut. After his parents divorced, his mother decided to move with he and his brother to Weston, Vermont, where he indulged his love for hunting, fishing, and sking. 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 an Ikoflex, 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.” 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 developed prints of the photographs he was taking of his friends and neighbors.

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 and Pablo Casales.

Early Career

After graduating in 1955, Miller enlisted in the U.S. Army and became a Signal Corps photographer. He received an assignment to photograph top brass in Europe and on his own time, he took dozens of black-and white photographs of post-war Paris.

When he completed his tour of duty in 1958, Miller got a job 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, however, he was not responsible for taking photographs. The job did get him writing and gave him an opportunity to learn 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 which he sold in 1968. From 1969-1980 he was a contributing editor and photographer for Ski magazine based in New York City. In 1981 he started working as a freelance photographer and writer and became a stock photographer for the Image Bank, Iconica, and Picade, a cooperative stock photographer agency.

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, and Vermont Gathering Places were all published by Silver Print Press.

His book, Hardly Anything Happens in Colbyville, Vermont is an anthology of twenty-seven stories written or edited by Miller about his hometown, “a forgotten hamlet of Waterbury now under attack from development and sprawl.”

Following publication of Vermont Farm Women, Miller set up the Vermont Farm Women’s Fund and donates part of the proceeds from the sale of his book to the fund. In 2006 he was the first author and photographer named Vermonter of the Year by the Burlington Free Press and the Vermont state legislature.

His photographs have been exhibited in one-man shows in New York, Paris, and Tokyo, and are on display in his gallery in Colbyville, Vermont

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 (Revised edition, seventh printing, 2003) Vermont Gathering Places (Silver Print Press, 2005) Hardly Anything Happens in Colbyville (2008)

Awards

Lifetime Achievement in Ski Journalism The Image Bank Award for Visual Excellence Ben Franklin Award for People of the Great Plains Ben Franklin Award for Vermont Farm Women Independent Publisher’s Award for Vermont Farm Women Vermonter of the Year 2006 from the Vermont State Legislature

References

External Links

Peter Miller official website: www.petermillerphotography.com Peter Miller blog: http://pmillervermont.wordpress.com/ Peter Miller Books: www.silverprintpress.com