Family History - Harry H. Miller, Homesteader and Merchant
Minnie V. Miller, Homesteader and Teacher

Wedding portraits - September 8, 1909

Harry H. Miller arrived in Ambrose in 1905 at the age of 22.  Harry, along with an older brother Dave, and their father Archibald started the firm known as A. Miller & Sons. Their store offered hardware, farm implements, harnesses, and other items for a growing rural community.  The business flourished, and in 1907 they erected the A. Miller & Sons store, a two-story brick building that once stood proudly on the corner of Main Street and Third Avenue.

1908 photo showing the original store to the left of the new brick structure.
The undertaking operation was moved to the smaller building after the new store opened.

It was also in 1907 that Miss Minnie V. Anderson arrived in Ambrose to prove up her homestead on the SW quarter of section 20 in Clinton Township T162N-R101W.  She was armed with a letter of introduction to Mr. James M. Miller from Mr. William J. Gerding who was soon to become her brother-in-law.  Will, who knew Jim from when they farmed in Portal, was engaged to Minnie's sister Emma. Minnie also had an order for lumber for her "homestead shack" which had been made out in Portal.

When she arrived at the A. Miller & Sons store, Jim Miller, recently married to Mattie Burreson, decided it would be much better to turn this maiden homesteader over to his younger, single brother. So, as it turned out, it was Harry who escorted Miss Anderson to the lumberyard to order her lumber from Mr. Andrew Almos. And then, since the Millers had every available carpenter busy building their new store, Mr. A. Miller loaned her one of them, a Mr. Anholt, for the few days that it would take to get her 12 x 12 shack built.

As soon as her home was completed and she got moved in, some older homesteaders with families learned that she had been a teacher before she had embarked on this new adventure, and asked if she could teach their children. The biggest problem was that there was no school, so she had to teach in an abandoned homestead shack. This was agreed to, on the condition that the building had no bugs.

Thus, the first school in Clinton Township began.  But it did not last long as the friendly little creatures started appearing from behind the blue paper lining.  The newly formed school board then asked Miss Anderson if she would teach in her own shack, and she agreed.  Her bed and table were hinged to swing up onto the walls, and a table and two benches were built for the students.  These they brought in each morning and took out again each afternoon.  There were 11 children in all eight grades!

By the next year a new school house had been built, and Miss Anderson and her pupils moved in.  After that year Miss Anderson gave up her teaching career.  The young Harry Miller had been courting the school marm, and in 1909 offered her what seemed like a better job than teaching.

Miss Anderson paid $1.25 an acre to purchased her Clinton Township homestead from the US General Land Office on June 7, 1909, and later that summer returned to her family's home in Minnesota.  The patent on her homestead was issued during the presidency of William H. Taft.

Harry Miller joined her in Minnesota in September 1909 and they were married.  On their return to Ambrose, they were met at the Soo depot by the town band and a wagon drawn by one horse and one ox, and were thus ceremoniously paraded up Main Street.  The couple set up housekeeping in their honeymoon cottage on Harry's homestead one mile west and a half mile north of Ambrose on the NW quarter of section 11 T163N-R99W.

In 1910 they moved to town and took over the A. Miller home on the corner of Bernard Street and Third Avenue, shown in this 1914 photograph.  The senior Millers, Archibald and Jessie, moved the homestead cottage to town, added on a couple of rooms, and lived there until they retired to Victoria, British Columbia.

Harry Miller was prominent in city government, the Presbyterian Church, and the Masonic Lodge.  Minnie Miller taught Sunday School classes at the church, belonged to the Embroidery Club and the Order of the Eastern Star.  Unfortunately, this happy marriage was not destined to last for long.  On November 9, 1926, at the age of 43, Harry was killed in a freak accident while he and his cousin Archie Shaw were unloading a Fordson tractor from a railroad car.  This left Minnie with three sons, George age 14, Harry age 10, and Gordon age 5.  This photo, taken in the spring of 1926, was the last of the family.

In all, six children were born to Harry and Minnie, but, sadly, three died in infancy.  Their three boys, George, Harry, and Gordon did grow to adulthood.

Their oldest son, Andrew George Miller moved to Chula Vista, California as a young man.  There he married Virginia Meyers and raised three daughters: Giny, Joy, and Heather.

Harry Archibald Miller, a bachelor, made his home during the summer months in the Miller family home on Bernard Street, but he often spent winters in San Diego to be near his mother until her death in 1976.

Since Harry's death in 1997, George's daughter Joy and her husband Roger make the trek from San Diego to Ambrose every summer to work on the Miller family abode, carrying on the tradition that Uncle Harry established.  Joy loves to invite family and friends to join them in Ambrose every year.  Joy's sisters Giny and Heather have thoroughly enjoyed their visits to Ambrose.  Joy's son Peter Campbell, his wife Melody, and their one-year old son Nathan visited in July 2005.  Son Christopher Campbell and his friend Kimberly plan to visit in July 2006.

A related news article by Laura Enerson,  "Regaining Some Ambrose Luster" was published in the August 4, 2004 edition of "The Journal", Crosby, North Dakota.

Gordon Clare Miller, the youngest son of Harry and Minnie, graduated from Ambrose High School in 1938 and moved to White Plains, New York.  He and his wife Charlotte (Belsan) had a son, Keith and a daughter, Karen.  Gordon's daughter Karen is planning her first visit to Ambrose for the 2006 Centennial.

<A. Miller Genealogy>

Family history taken from pages 171 - 172 of the
Divide County History 1974, Crosby, North Dakota
(Edited for content)
Updated by Joy (Miller) Schlarb, August 2005