Executive
Committee & Advisory Board | Board History | Program Descriptions | Contact Us
Mission Statement
The Miller Institute is "dedicated to the encouragement of creative
thought and the conduct of research and investigation in the field of pure
science and investigation in the field of applied science in so far as such
research and investigation are deemed by the Advisory Board to offer a
promising approach to fundamental problems."
History
Adolph C. Miller was born in San Francisco on
January 7, 1866. He entered the University of California in 1883 and was active
throughout his student life. Upon graduation, he was awarded the Harvard Club
Prize for graduate study at Harvard and then continued his studies in Paris and
Munich. Following his return to the United States, he served as an instructor
in Economics at Harvard before being appointed Assistant Professor of Political
Science at the University of California at Berkeley, in 1890. The following
year he accepted an Associate Professorship in Political Economics and Finance
at Cornell University. After one year at Cornell, however, Miller was persuaded
to move to the University of Chicago where he was given a full Professorship of
Finance. In 1895, Adolph Miller married Mary Sprague (pictured on the left in
the photo below), the eldest child of Otho Sprague, a
prosperous Chicago businessman. In 1902, President Benjamin Ide Wheeler
convinced Miller to return to Berkeley as Flood Professor of Economics and
Commerce and to develop the newly established College of Commerce (the
forerunner to the present Haas School of Business). After eleven years of
service to the University of California, Miller resigned to become the United
States Assistant Secretary to the Interior under his former classmate, Franklin
K. Lane. The following year the Federal Reserve System was established and President
Wilson appointed Miller to its Board of Governors, a position he held for
twenty-two years under five presidents (Wilson, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover and
Franklin Roosevelt).
 |
Photo provided by Gregory Mitchell,
grand-nephew of Mary Sprague Miller. |
Despite their residence in Washington, the
Millers' ties to Berkeley remained strong. They donated 250 acres of the Locatelli Ranch in the Santa Cruz Mountains near Boulder
Creek to the University to be used as a center for faculty conferences and
recreation. Later, two additional gifts of $10,000 each were made to support
the property. In 1937, the University bestowed honors on its benefactor by
asking Adolph Miller to deliver the first Bernard Moses Memorial Lecture. In
1940, he was awarded an honorary LL.D. degree with the following citation by
President Sproul: "Native son of California;
graduate of this University, and the first head of its Department of Economics;
for twenty years a member of the Federal Reserve Board, contributing in a
unique and invaluable way to its deliberations through his keen mind, sound
thinking, and profound mastery of economic theory."
 |
Adolph Miller |
In 1943, Adolph C. and Mary Sprague Miller
entered into a trust with the Board of Regents of the University of California
to establish an institute "dedicated to the encouragement of creative
thought and conduct of research and investigation in the field of pure
science." Upon the death of Dr. Miller on February 11, 1953, a fund in the
amount of $2,856,566 became available to the University. The "Statement
Establishing the Institute for Basic Research in Science" was submitted to
the Regents on October 14, 1955 and was subsequently approved. The organization
of the Institute began. On January 10, 1957, Mrs. Miller died and an additional
$2,159,945 became available. At that time the names of the donors became public
and the Institute was designated: "The Adolph C. and Mary Sprague Miller
Institute for Basic Research in Science". The first appointments to the
Miller Institute were awarded in January 1957.
Organization
 |
Franklin Lane, Anne Lane,
Mary Sprague, Adolph
Miller |
The Miller Institute is guided by the
"Statement Establishing the Institute for Basic Research in Science"
and the "Deed of Trust". An Advisory Board is charged with overseeing the Institute. The President of the
University is the official President of the Advisory Board, but since the time
of Clark Kerr that role has been delegated to the Chancellor of the Berkeley
campus. Four of the eight Advisory Board members are faculty members of
Berkeley science departments. They constitute the Executive Committee, charged
with carrying out the policies determined by the Advisory Board. One member of
the Executive Committee is designated as
the "Executive Director of the Institute" and "Vice Chairman of
the Advisory Board". The remaining board members, appointed in accordance
with trust stipulations, are from outside of the University of California and
are selected from nominations submitted by the members of the Advisory Board.
Program Descriptions
For more INFO: Read the
Miller Institute Brochure.
Make a Gift!
Email: millerinstitute@berkeley.edu
More Contact Info
