Memorial Mass for Edward N. Mills

Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel

On January 17, 2015, Thomas Aquinas College lost a dear friend, a generous benefactor, and a longserving member of its Board of Governors. After a long illness, Edward N. Mills passed away at his home in Oak View, California, at the age of 84.

A man of business and technology, Mr. Mills had no particular interest in Catholic liberal education until he started seeing the effects it had on his children, four of whom graduated from Thomas Aquinas College. Over time, as he met his children’s classmates, he became a fervent advocate of the College. In 1992 he joined its Board of Governors, which he dutifully served until his retirement in 2006. By resolution of his erstwhile colleagues, he was then granted emeritus status in honor of his many years of exemplary work.

Throughout the years, Mr. Mills and his wife, Dolores, not only made many significant financial contributions to the College, they also donated a large collection of sacred objects rescued from shuttered churches in their home state of Wisconsin. Among these items are the crucifix that hangs in St. Joseph Commons, the statues of Sts. Matthew and Thérèse that stand in Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity Chapel’s gardens, and the Chapel’s century-old Stations of the Cross. In 2010 the College inducted Mr. and Mrs. Mills into the Order of St. Albert the Great in honor of their decades of generosity.

“Ed Mills was a good and faithful friend of the College and a true leader on the Board of Governors,” says President Michael F. McLean. “I hope that all members of the College community will join us in praying for the repose of his soul and for the consolation of his beloved family.”

Mr. Mills was born and raised in the chemical business. His father worked at the Shell Oil refinery in Roxana, Illinois, a company town that so dominated the 1,200 people who lived there that even the high school team was known as the “Shells.”

While working as a counselor at a local Boy Scout Camp during the summer before his senior year in high school, Ed met a young girl from nearby Alton, Illinois, Miss Dolores Springman. Dolores was one of eight children from a devout Catholic family. Ed was an only child from a non-practicing Presbyterian family. The two began dating, and in short order the Catholic example of Dolores and her family left its mark on Ed. By Christmas break of his freshman year at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, he entered the Church. In 1950, at the end of his sophomore year, he and Dolores were married.

After graduating, Mr. Mills took a job with Shell’s Chemical Division as a sales correspondent, and a few years later he went into business for himself, launching the Milwaukee Solvents and Chemical Corporation. He quickly found a niche in reclamation efforts, taking used chemicals and making them reusable through chemical processing. By 1998, when Mr. Mills sold Milsolv and retired to Oak View, California, the corporation had grown to 160 employees in three states and was doing $114 million in business annually. Mrs. Mills was with him every step of the way. “She’s been the best business partner I’ve ever had,” he once remarked.