Miller, John Wesley

Part 1 of 8 was recorded on April 9th, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and covers the following themes: 

b. 1933 

  • Growing up in rural Missouri. Father’s employment odyssey during the depression and World War II. Move to Tucson in 1948. First impressions of Tucson. 

  • School, including attending shifts at Tucson High. Social life and academics. Taking history classes from George Miller, later mayor of Tucson. Inclusivity. Arizona Boys State program. 

  • Enrolling at the UA in engineering. Getting married during college, wife’s unplanned pregnancy and academic ramifications. 

  • Working through high school and college. Building first house in 1953, while a sophomore at the UA. 

  • Before marriage, social and fraternity life at the UA. Double-dating with former mayor Lew Murphy. Drive-in movies. School dances and boondockers. Getting invited to country clubs with sand greens. 

  • Minimal work opportunities for women. Parents’ expectations for Miller’s education and trade knowledge. The early years of electrical engineering and computers. 

  • The pace of technological change in Miller’s life. 

  • The work of children: Miller’s paper route as an 8 year-old and physical labor for parents. 

Part 2 of 8 was recorded on May 21st, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and covers the following themes:

  • Resuming in 1953 with Miller building his first house, having his first child, and dropping out of the UA to work.

  • Planning, zoning, and a lack of building codes in the early 1950s.

  • Local banking and finance.

  • Building materials and architecture: the rise of drywall, brick versus concrete block.

  • Changes in permitting across Miller’s career. Handshakes as building contracts.

  • Accessibility of home loans in the wake of the Second World War, increase in home ownership, and the Green Hills Community.

  • The Southern Arizona housing market in the 1950s. Mid-century Tucson builders, including Bob Lusk. Miller’s father’s collaboration with Grant Road Lumber. Rise of home inspections.

  • Founding Hidden Valley, Inc. In 1959 and branching into real estate as well as construction. Increasing bureaucratic complexity of selling houses. Housing speculation.

  • Large builders in Tucson: Estes Homes, Perfect Arizona Type Homes, and Del Webb’s Pueblo Gardens. Custom builders versus large builders.

  • Increasing size of houses over Miller’s career. Landscaping trends in the 1950s.

  • Miller’s odyssey across many neighborhoods in Tucson—moving steadily away from downtown and ultimately returning to midtown. Rise of contracts in construction.

Part 3 of 8 was recorded on May 31st, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and covers the following themes: 

  • Getting license to build all types of structures in 1969. Development of Hidden Valley and Rock Cliff. 

  • The “Pantano line” blocking Tucson’s eastward growth in the 1960s and Miller’s father’s successful lawsuit against Pima County zoning.  

  • Rise of Santa Fe-style architecture in the early 1970s. Fear and the proliferation of garage-dominated houses. Air conditioning and moving insulation from the interior to the exterior of houses. 

  • Building science, window insulation, and thermal mass. Frame homes overtaking masonry starting in the 1980s. 

  • The relationship between regulatory complexity and consolidation of home builders. Miller’s current work helping shepherd small builders’ projects through bureaucracy. 

  • Government incentives versus regulations for builders. Rise of Tucson Home Builders, later Southern Arizona Home Builders Association. The community of builders. Housing cycles and the housing market collapse of 2008. 

  • Growing environmental awareness and interest in sustainability. Negotiating between the interests of builders, home buyers, government, and environmentalists. 

  • The creation of the University of Arizona’s Environmental Research Lab in the early 1970s and Pima County’s interest in solar. Collaborating with scientists to make sustainable technology affordable, scalable, and accepted by builders. 

Part 4 of 8 was recorded on August 17th, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona. It covers the following themes: 

  • Consolidation of builders and role of national builders in Tucson’s housing landscape. Development aesthetics. Lot sizes and land use influences. 

  • Hidden Valley development in 1957-59: lot sizes, early master-planned development, environmental considerations. Further details on father’s zoning lawsuit against Pima County. Sustainability within developments versus within communities. 

  • Population move out of the central city from the sixties through 2000s, leaving empty lots.  

  • Expansion of City and County sewer systems. 1975 adoption of County Building Code. 

  • Traffic with increased urban and suburban sprawl. Country clubs as anchors of suburban development.  

  • Renewed interest in living in the center of the city and challenge of finding lots within the city. 

  • Interest in revitalizing downtown, developing Armory Park del Sol, and restoring McClellan Building. 

Part 5 of 8 was recorded on September 10th, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and covers the following themes:

  • Survey of sustainability and energy efficiency over Miller’s career.  Carl Hodges and the UA Solar Lab in the fifties.  

  • Green building and the changing attitudes of contractors. 

  • Example of early green building. Tucson and Austin, TX as leaders in sustainable building experiments in the 1970s. The popularity of the SAHBA green committee. Masonry versus frame in terms of sustainability. 

Part 6 of 8 was recorded on September 25th, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and it covers the following themes: 

  • Beginning of Civano in 1981 and statewide interest in the creation of a solar village. Attempts to make solar technology aesthetically appealing, dealing with anti-solar HOAs. Civano houses versus standard houses in the 1980s. Passive design and sighting. 

  • Arizona Solar Energy Commission. 

  • Civano planning process. 

  • Builders in Civano, from custom to volume. The challenges of moving solar projects through political landscape. Bipartisan support. Miller’s inability to build at Civano, despite conceptualizing the project. Intellectual connection between Civano and Armory Park del Sol. 

  • Miller’s early involvement in Biosphere 2. Renovating UA conference center and constructing support buildings. Getting the general contract to build Biosphere 2. 

  • Biosphere 2 subcontractors, construction challenges, and collaborators.  

Part 7 of 8 was recorded on December 4th, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and it covers the following themes: 

  • Technical challenges of building Biosphere 2: air expansion and the development of the lungs. Sealing the building. 

  • Social and legal challenges to construction: land use, road ownership, mining claims, Oracle. 

  • Collaborating with specialists in different fields, learning from scientists and researchers. Personal expectations for the project. Code compliance when building an unprecedented structure. 

  • Construction lessons that carried into Miller’s later projects. 

  • Consulting work for the Biosphere until 1995: land acquisition, rezoning, and water rights surrounding the Biosphere. Development potential for hotels, apartments, commercial structures on surrounding land. 

  • The effect of the Biosphere job on Miller’s custom home business. 

  • Working with scientists and engineers to make biomes function as well as possible. 

  • Returning to real estate and development after Biosphere 2, and ultimately back to home construction. 

  • Managing land acquisition funds for a San Francisco investor, purchasing the Lakes at Castle Rock. 

Part 8 of 8 was recorded on December 18th, 2018 at John Wesley Miller’s office in Tucson, Arizona and it covers the following themes: 

  • Armory Park del Sol. Area before development. Scaling down sustainability techniques used in low-density, large-footprint foothills houses and implementing in a dense community. 

  • Work with community to maintain aesthetics of neighborhood. 

  • The urban-suburban-urban odyssey of Miller’s career. Importance of mountain views. 

  • The importance of residential downtown. Attractions of dense downtown. Demographics of Armory Park del Sol and other downtown developments.  

  • Challenges of infill development versus suburban development. Lack of large areas for construction within Tucson City limits, changes in City codes and regulations. 

  • Seeing Tucson grow over a lifetime. Future growth potential. 

Aengus Anderson