If you have trouble taking things with a grain of salt, we would advise you to stick with the white-bread version of Peter's bio (we got a complaint recently...)

Peter Mitchell Miller
20 Crossroad
Waterbury, Vermont 05676

Tel. 802.244.5339.     Fax: 802.244.6813
Email: Peter@silverprintpress.com
Website:  www.silverprintpress.com

Education

Early Latin from Benedictine Monks in Morristown, NJ. Football and skiing major preoccupations during high school at Burr and Burton Seminary, Manchester, Vermont. Skipped school for two weeks to go deer hunting. Subsequently had rifles stolen. Used money to buy a camera. Decided then to work in journalism for LIFE MAGAZINE.

1955. BA in Literature from University of Toronto, Canada. Very lazy student, cruised through on what the Benedictines taught. Took pictures to help pay way through college. In junior year worked as assistant to Yousuf Karsh as he photographed famous people in Europe. Caught Lord Montbatten in his skivvies, almost poisoned with rotten food by Albert Schweitzer, Picasso smoked last cigarette, soared with Pablo Casals and Bach in a small cathedral in Prades, France.

Published article and pictures on that experience in 12 page layout in Canadian magazine. Freelanced my first article with writing and pictures on the Benedictine Monastery in Weston, Vermont, to Jubilee Magazine. Enlisted in US Army and spent two 1/2 years in Paris, France as a GI photographer, fighting my sergeant and eating in one and two star restaurants. Lived in the 9th, worked in civvies did lots of street photography and came back to USA with 12 cents in my pocket.

Work and other experiences

1959. Worked again for Karsh and decided I never again would be anyone's assistant. Refused to kiss Pope John's ring and gave up religion based on the history of the Catholic Church in the suppression and manipulation of the masses (I'm a pagan at heart; most photographers worship the sun).

1959-1965. Fulfilled my high school ambition by working for LIFE magazine not as a photographer but as a writer-reporter. Scooped the nation on the sinking of the Thresher nuclear sub. Scoop suppressed by LIFE. Quit and moved to Vermont. Oh, by the way I was married that year to a Canadian, a marriage made in hell, the only good result two children, Dodie and Hilary.

1965-1974. Started a ski magazine and was writer, editor, publisher, salesmen and general fink. Lost my shirt on that project; it went down the drain along with my marriage. Divorced and ended with a car, my shotguns, fishing rods and my dog. Spent the next couple of years satiating suppressed sexual cravings. Did a good bit of drinking too. Had a lot of fun. Wild heartbeat affair ended when triangle became a rectangle. Moved seriously into freelancing as a writer and photographer.Wrote the book The 30,000 Mile Ski Race.

1975-1986. became successful writer and photographer, more on writing. Authored four books, one on hunting, one on skiing, one on photography. Decided I didn't want to do anything serious during this life. Happiest when skiing in the high Alps, fishing in Montana, or going someplace I haven't been before. Experienced the isolation of beauty in the Atacama desert. Began doing stock photography seriously in 1983 for Image Bank. Moved to Manhattan.

1986. Gave up magazine writing as major occupation and switched to stock photography. Quit position at SKI magazine as contributing writer and photographer-very sick of "bureaucratic editors" who censor for advertisers rather than edit for readers. Published editorial as to that fact. Hated by SKI Magazine staff. Eclectic, compulsive photographer more on the journalistic side; disliked working in his small studio unless the subject is women. Find best talents used when doing writing and photography as a documentary on a culture. Moved back to Vermont: kicked out of Manhattan by the Yuppie syndrome.

1989. Started a project titled Vermont People, a book of black and white photographs and text designed so that the photography and writing co-habitate. Portraits are of Vermonters who are anachronisms in their lifetime. Fourteen publishers turned the book down, mortgaged the house and sel-published it. Sold out the first edition of 3,000 in six weeks, sold out the second edition of 5,000 by 1993. Printed another 3,000 in 1995, sold that out. Revised the book in 1999. Now the book is in its fifth printing, total 15.500. Figured that maybe publishers are not too bright.

Held six exhibitions of the photographs from Vermont People. Became bored with it and gave the prints to the State of Vermont, requested they be permanently displayed in the state offices. Moved into the art field and began hand coloring photographs but bored again. Have a large file of black and white never printed that goes back 40 years.

1993-1995. Began a new project called People of the Great Plains. Spent seven months towing a 17 foot, 1968 Airstream camper 35,000 miles through the high Plains west of the 98th Meridian. Found, on this spiritual quest for America's roots, that the search was inward. Rancher in Nebraska said I was like the Dodo bird that flies backwards-knows where it has been but not where it's going. People of the Great Plains turned downed by 22 publishers. Spent all the money earned from Vermont People on the Plains project. In 1995 won a cash grant of $25,000 to continue the book.

1996. Wrote, edited and self-published People of the Great Plains, put myself $100,000 in debt. Introduced the book in late August at the Slope County Fair in North Dakota, sold 100 books. People shook my hand for identifying their culture, being on their side. Set up a 60 print traveling exhibition of the Plains photos at The Museum of the Great Plains, Lawton, Oklahoma. Book wins four awards.

1998. Only $50,000 in debt from the Plains book. Reprinted Vermont People with New Jersey printer after local printer goes out of business. Disastrous results with printing and deadline. Didn't know whether to slit my throat or call the Mafia. Halted half the print run. Set up website. Started a new book, Vermont Farm Women.  Set up 50 print exhibition contrasting Vermont People and People of the Great Plains. Quit selling photography stock through Image Bank, because they wanted too much exclusivity. Kissed good-by $60,000 a year. Six weeks later they change their exclusivity contract.

1999. No time to think. No time to relax. No time for love. Turned 65 and the mirror on the wall lies. No IRA, no savings, no stock, a large mortgage and equity loan borrowed to the hilt. Well…What the hell. Random House publishes The First Time I Saw Paris, photographs taken by a young and naïve Peter Miller in the 1950's when he was a Signals Corps Photographer. Text wrote in 1999. Made Paris prints and wrote text. Friend packages it to Random House. Book published in the fall of 1999 in conjunction with a photo exhibition at Leica Gallery in New York and Tokyo. .

2000. First Time I Saw Paris is translated into French and renamed Paris Perdu et Retrouvé and sold in bookstores in all French-speaking countries in Europe and in Quebec (is that part of Canada?)

2001. Hit the road in the Air Stream to photograph Vermont Farm Women, a book due out in 2002. Also do work for Vermont Land Trust. Get exhausted. Depressed after September 11. Quit working and took a vacation to Mexico with children.

Set up the Trade Towers As They Were, photo auction at the Mist Grill in Waterbury; a fund raiser for families of Windows of the World employees, 79 who were killed. Photos are large scale color prints of the Twin Towers taken in the 1980's. Raised $12,000. Vermont in Black and White, scenics only, follows Trade Towers show at the Mist Grill.

2002. Spent January to July writing stories about 40 women who are in the Vermont Farm Women Book. Set up a Vermont Farm Women Fund. Book to come out in October, God help me with deadlines and enough money to pay for the printing.

2003-2004 Very, very bad years. Depressed. Too much business and beware of the self-entitlement generation. Once again I learned that the most trustworthy person I know is myself and my children.  Topped it off by falling off a roof after an aluminum ladder broke under me. Couldn't move well for two months but very, very lucky.

2005. Wrote and photographed and published Vermont Gathering Places, a book paid for by The Preservation Trust of Vermont. The last of my trilogy that shows the importance of a downtown small community for the interaction of Vermonters. Caveat--don't sprawl and save at least some of our culture and our traditions.

2006. Honored as 2006 Vermonter of the Year by the Burlington Free Press and the Vermont State Legislature. Nice but it doesn't pay bills. Went to India to work on a web site and see how the hi tech sector works. Visited my daughter in London and swung through Brittany. Home and out of shape, so I thought,  but while exercising had a recurring pain in the arm and chest. Upshot was a stent in the widow maker's artery. Doctor said I was very lucky. Was told not to do anything for a month. Exercised and went to Vail for five days and skied my head off in beautiful snow. Thought if I was going to die, the best place is high on a snow-covered mountain. Didn't die. Took over Silver Print Press from my assistant, spent the year organizing it and putting it in the black.

2007. Again working alone and happy for it. Starting to work on digitizing my photo archive. Have learned to love and hate the computer. Still shooting black and white film but most color is digital. Debating with myself to do more writing or more photography.

Cannot take discipline and structured life. Against, with Sartre, the Bourgeoisie. Unmarriageable. Chameleon quality of fitting into different lifestyles. Good interviewer. Psychologically omniscient, satiric tongue when provoked. Uses intuition rather than intelligence. No patience. Prefers bird hunting with a Brittany Spaniel and 20 gauge Parker shotgun.. Loves skiing and trout fishing. Uses custom-designed panoramic cameras, Leicas Nikons and a Mac G5. Hates all phones and has a vicious phone manner. Most at ease in New York City or Paris or alone (or with a woman), or in a field with a view in Vermont or high in the French Alps. Always broke but likes to cook.

Has a studio, black and white darkroom, production and computer room under his apartment in a converted Vermont farm house the bank owns. Lives within 200 yards of Ben & Jerry's factory, sees Vermont becoming gentrified in the New Jersey image. Democrat rather than Republican. Non violent anarchist rather than liberal. Prefers women's company to men, although not constantly and not the same woman. Better writer than photographer claim some but happiest when taking photographs outdoors, most satisfied after he writes something well. Most dissatisfied after some editor censors it into oblivion. Doesn't trust business men. Doesn't like growing old. Becomes very disgruntled when there is no time to be creative.

Gets along fine with himself and doesn't mind living alone-most of the time. Likes to burn bridges to keep from going back, looks forward rather than backwards. Needs to concentrate more on the being of the present and the feeling of Zen, just to slow down. Gets along fine with his children, one in London, the other in Oregon.

No lady friend at the present but there's hope. Doesn't need Viagra…Well, maybe. Sleeps in the nude. Works too hard. Uses Fujichrome and Velvia for photo film and Tri X for black and white. Reads French and speaks it terribly. Takes bubble baths and uses Parker shotguns. Favorite dog is Brittany Spaniel on point over a woodcock. Favorite ice cream is Berthillon's fraises du bois from the Isle St. Louis in Paris. Cooks with chipotles. Makes applesauce with habanero peppers and puts it over corn flakes for breakfast. Hair turning white but it's still there. Spending too much time in front of the computer and putting on weight. Had past lives in France, Belgium and the Gobi desert. Prefers to ski very fast.

Favorite self criticism-"That was real stupid."