The collection contains 23 images. Images from 1954 bear ink inscriptions on verso, perhaps dating to the original production of the photoraphs. Images from May 1953 bear verso inscriptions written in pencil in a different hand, dating from after the donation of the materials to the Preservation Society of Newport County.
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Description or title of item, PSNCA.H.055: Robert S. Miller house and hurricane photographs, Box 1, Folder 1, Preservation Society of Newport County, Newport, RI.
The collection is organized at the item level in a single series, filed as found.
Robert Stanley Miller (1930-2001) was born in Providence, Rhode Island on November 28, 1930, to Frederick Rufus Miller (1886-1964) and Ellen Miller (1891-1961). Growing up in Riverside, Rhode Island, he attended East Providence High School before enlisting in the United States Air Force in 1951. He served as an Airman First Class in the United States Air Force during the Korean War and was discharged in 1955.
Many of Miller's photographs in this collection depict damage to Newport caused by Hurricane Carol, which caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, killed 65 people, and injured over one thousand people in late August and the beginning of September of 1954. The hurricane's winds measured 125-135 mph in some places, destroying over 1500 homes in New England as well as nearly forty percent of fruit and vegetable crops growing in the region. In Newport, the Casino and Bailey's Beach in particular suffered damage. The Weather Bureau retired the hurricane name "Carol," as well as the subsequent serious hurricanes "Edna" and "Hazel," for a decade afterward. The impact of these storms influenced the formation of the National Hurricane Research Project.
Miller died June 24, 2001 and is buried at the North Burial Ground in Providence, Rhode Island. His older brother Elmer Fred Miller (1926-2001) was the father of three children, one of whom was the donor, Paul F. Miller.
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