The Willis H. Miller Papers consist of personal, family, business, and collected papers, documenting his life and family and the history of Hudson. The collection is arranged in six series: Personal, Hudson Star-Observer Records, Hammond News Records, Publishers Printing Service Records, Family Papers, and Collected Papers Relating to Hudson. Beginning in his years at Saint Olaf College, Miller kept a journal and preserved letters he received. His later interests in local history, genealogy, travel, stamp collecting, and people generally, encouraged his letter writing and collecting further, especially during World War II. The Miller papers preserved here are not a complete collection; he has donated personal papers and collected documents to a number of other repositories, most notably his diaries of the 1940s and 1950s to the Minnesota Historical Society.
About one-half of this collection consists of correspondence with friends and relatives, business acquaintances, persons sharing genealogical information, people writing letters to the editor, and people the world over. Most of this correspondence is found in the PERSONAL series. Correspondence with Mari Ann Sprissler of Frankenthal, Germany, dates to the mid-1930s. Letters from Saint Olaf's concern courses, work-study hours, and the student health service. During World War II, many letters from people in military service and from others, both Americans and Europeans, share their views of the difficulties of war. Most notable in the files from 1960-1980 is an extensive series of letters from prison inmates. Following the container list are processors' notes on genealogical information found within letters. Also in the Personal series are Miller's diaries (1935-1939, 1968-1981), financial records, travel reports which were published in the Star-Observer, and other items.
HUDSON STAR-OBSERVER RECORDS include primarily financial records plus some correspondence and other items. Similarly the series for the HAMMOND NEWS and the PUBLISHERS PRINTING SERVICE consist largely of financial information.
FAMILY PAPERS date 1862-1959 and include Civil War letters, twentieth century family correspondence, military and pension documents, an autobiography of Miller's father, and other items.
The COLLECTED PAPERS RELATING TO HUDSON contain various records of area people, businesses, and organizations. Most prominent in quantity are papers concerning the Hudson Toll Bridge, 1909-1917; documents on the Hudson Housing Authority, 1967-1979; and records of the Saint Croix County Historical Society, 1945-1971.
