If you want someone to do a good job for you in the present and future, you need someone who has done well in the past. Larry R. Miller
	Biography for Larry R. Miller, Born in Los Angeles, California 1940. His parents moved to Riverside, California in 1948 and to Robbins, California (Northern California) in 1955. Larry graduated from Sutter Union High, Sutter California, 1958. Joined the US Marines June, 1958.

Larry was released from US Marines with an honorable discharge in 1960. He worked briefly for Johnson Tractor Co. in Riverside before moving back to N. California. Larry worked days as a welder and truck driver for Pacific Guano in Robbins, California, a chemical fertilizer company, and nights as the night foreman at a rice mill for approximately six months. When an opening became available for a welder and apprentice field mechanic at Marysville Tractor and Equipment, the area Caterpillar and John Deere dealer, Larry applied and was accepted.

Larry was sent to welding school, mechanics school, parts management schools, store management schools and was transferred and promoted from the service section to assistant parts manager and then to satellite store manager in 1963. When Marysville Tractor bought out Weaver Tractor Co., another Caterpillar dealer, they changed their name to Tenco Tractor and wanted Larry to move to Sacramento, CA. and go into sales. Larry and his wife had gone on vacation to Oregon and neither wanted to move to, and live in, Sacramento. After giving eight months notice, Larry and family moved to Eugene, OR where he went to work for Fisher Implement Co. a John Deere dealer. The job wasn’t what it had been reported to be and after one month Larry went to work for Timber Tractor Co. the area Allis-Chalmers dealer as assistant parts manager.

Larry was contacted by Ross Equipment, the World’s Largest Loraine Crane dealer, and offered the position of general parts manager and purchasing agent. In early 1967, Larry was offered the distributorship for a line of automotive filters, parts and supplies. In late 1968 Larry quit Ross Equipment and went into business for himself. Larry and his first wife bought a corner “Mom and Pop” grocery store during the same time period. In 1968 Larry expanded his automotive business and purchased a gas station.

Larry began driving race cars professionally in 1968. He was the high points driving champion in SCCA Northwest Region in 1969. He was also Formula Ford champion, B Sedan champion and B Sports Racing champion at various times. He drove formula A for an independent automotive related company and his next step was Indy cars. The glow faded with race cars so Larry began racing sailboats and teaching sailing. The Millers had sold the grocery store and moved the automotive business into two large buildings in NW Eugene in early 1970. In 1972, MTR Enterprises, Larry’s automotive business, had grown to be the largest, independent (non-dealer) Import parts and service facility in the state of Oregon. The business remained number 1 until its sale in 1979.

After the sale of the business, the Millers went sailing, first to Mexico and then to Hawaii. In 1982, Larry received the “Sailor of the Year” award for the Island of Kauai, Hawaii. An opportunity had in Hawaii presented itself in 1981 and Larry went back into business importing Japanese auto body and hard parts. Larry and his first wife divorced in 1984.

Larry was a US Olympic team hopeful in racewalking at age 44 and held all the records for the state of Hawaii. A sponsored athlete in his forties, Larry finished first in nine marathons in a row in his division and was the state USCF cycling champion five times in Hawaii and Oregon. Larry attributes much of his athletic success to daily exercise and T'ai Chi, which he began studying in the early 1980s. In 1990, Larry developed his own ultra short form of Tai Chi which he uses and teaches. Larry has also developed a lifetime training and fitness program that will be posted on this website as a PDF as soon as time permits.

Larry married Celinda Crawford-Mock in 1988 after a three year engagement. Together they sold their businesses and organic farm and double-hand sailed back to Oregon and lived on the coast for two years in Reedsport, Oregon. Ready for new adventures, they sold their sailboat and moved to Joseph, Oregon, two miles from the trailhead into the Eagle Cap Wilderness. They had taken on the caregiver duties for Larry’s mother in 1989 and continued to caregive until his mother's death in 1999.

In 2000, after engineering, building and completing their strawbale house in Columbus, NM, Larry took the summer off to do a four month, 4000 mile, hike, bike and kayak odyssey. Larry had been writing health, fitness,travel and sports articles as a freelancer since 1982 and the journey produced a full-length, nonfiction, first person adventure novel. The summer of 2001 was spent hiking. kayaking and fishing at various times in the White Mountains of Arizona with his youngest son Jeff, who had moved with his family to the Sedona, AZ area. During 2002, the Millers spent the summer at a world class resort learning the hospitality business. While there, they both taught health, wellness, T'ai Chi, Yoga and Larry taught fly fishing. After returning to New Mexico, they did promotion for the resort in the US.

Most of 2003 was spent reestablishing the trees and landscape that had died during the six months stay at the resort in 2002. The Millers had a house sitter and the house sitter had an ex-husband and that’s a long story. In July of 2004 Larry did a solo kayak trip on the Snake River, taking pictures, writing articles, pencil sketching the journey and developing a method for catching catfish on flies. In 2005, at the request of the owners, Larry returned to the resort where the Millers had spent 2002. Larry was supposed to only be there for the month of June while he helped establish a fly fishing program. Before leaving for the resort, Larry contacted people he’d met in 2002 and they came back to fish, hike and spend time at the resort while Larry was there. Larry’s one month became four and then it was off to Spain to do the El Camino de Santiago as a travel companion with one of the guests who had returned to the resort in June. Larry has written extensively about the trip to Spain and many articles can be found on the Internet and on his websites.

During the summer of 2006 Donal Ryan, a friend from Ireland who Larry had met in Spain the year before, came to visit in NM. They fished, hiked and explored the White Mountains of Arizona. Donal had never camped out in the "wilds" before and it was quite an experience for him. Larry had begun writing a weekly column for the Deming Headlight newspaper in 1995 and his articles were put on their Internet site beginning in 2002. Larry has done public speaking on assorted topics including health and fitness, plus photo and video presentations on various subjects for libraries, civic and private organizations. Larry did the video and produced a DVD for the Smithsonian Institute's traveling exhibit “Between Fences.”

NMFILMS had a by invitation only conference which Larry attended. While attending the conference, Larry realized that film making wasn’t what he wanted to do but he did want to use his sixteen years of experience and enjoyment for videoing and photography. He was asked to submit a proposal to the Deming Public Schools on teaching video, editing and other basic film making skills. The proposal was accepted but the district ran out of funds.

While doing research on the New Mexico/Mexico border area during the winter of 2005, Larry found that no one on record had ever run across the State of New Mexico from the Arizona border to the Texas border, a distance of 165 miles. During the spring and summer of 2006 Larry trained for the run and the run was completed in October. There was no night running. The overall accumulated time was 29 hours and 32 minutes.

During late 2005 and through 2006 Larry built and maintained web sites and wrote web copy for friends who needed help promoting their businesses. In 2008, Larry had over one million reads on the Internet that could be tracked, plus more that couldn't. in 2009 his reads averaged between 15,000 and 20,000 per day In 2008, Larry and Celinda volunteered on organic farms in California and Oregon under the WWOOF/USA program. In September 2008, the Millers bought a 32’ motorhome and, after winterizing it, left it at Larry’s oldest son’s home in Eugene then returned for the winter to New Mexico where they have rental property.

In 2009, the Millers went back to Oregon in late March, picked up their motorhome and reestablished their Oregon residency. During the summer and fall, they lived in their motorhome on a small farm in NE Oregon where they assisted the parents of a longtime friend. The parents are in their mid-eighties and not able to do many of the day to day chores. While there, Larry helped build a two car, one tractor garage, Celinda and Larry established an organic garden for the property owners and themselves, Larry built a roof over the carpentry shop and tore down the old equipment shed and garage combination. In return, the owners provided a full hookup RV space. When not occupied with their farm commitments, Celinda taught yoga and Larry went fly fishing. Larry’s fly fishing articles can be found by searching the Internet. The Millers have been invited to return to the farm in 2010. They’ve also been invited back to farms where they WWOOFed in 2008. Larry is presently doing a testimonial and demo video for an after market RV parts supplier.

The Millers enjoy making new friends, taking on and learning from new challenges and experiencing diverse adventures. On the return to NE Oregon in March, they will travel to Ojai in South Central California for a week or two stay on an organic mulberry farm. Then they’ll head north to Dixon, CA to help some people, who they met through the Internet, with their organic walnut and almond orchard. From there they’ll go west to Cloverdale, California to help friends they met while living in Hawaii with tomato seedlings and starts their friends sell through area businesses. The Miller’s travels, adventures and experiences will be chronicled on their websites, in Larry’s weekly newspaper column and through various Internet publishers.

Using skills, knowledge, adventures and experience from the past 40+ years, and anticipating new challenges, adventures and learning opportunities in the future, the Millers are looking forward to 2010 and beyond. Both are in excellent health and their vital signs are those of people half, or less, their age.

By doing an Internet search under Larry R. Miller, use the middle initial or you’ll get a car dealer, you can read other articles and find more information that isn't on this website.