Updated:
February 22, 2007
rank Miller was not a man of great wealth, but he was a visionary and entrepreneur. He shared his vision and inspired others to invest in his projects. Railroad magnate Henry Huntington invested $75,000 of an estimated $250,000 to build the first phase of the Mission Inn (Klotz, 1982). The influx of funding from Huntington and others provided Miller with the opportunity to create his vision of California’s past.
Miller succeeded in a business where others failed. He capitalized on many opportunities, including the loss of another Riverside hotel to fire. Despite all of this, his formal education was limited. In fact, his future wife Isabella Hardenberg became his teacher. In her 1938 biography, Frank Miller of Mission Inn, author Zona Gale quotes Miller as saying, "I began my study of reading and grammar last night. (Isabella) hears me recite every other evening. She has helped me be good by her own noble example." (p. 34).
We have no way of knowing whether Miller worked on his lessons at this particular desk. According to his second wife Marion, “That desk was in his office when I came here and I was his secretary.” (The Press, May 22, 1967, Section B, p. 1). She noted that her husband kept the desk in order. He never let his lack of formal education get in the way of either his success or his pride.
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