FARMINGTON — Mills & Mills Attorney at Law recently celebrated 100 years in the downtown area.
Attorney Paul Mills is enthusiastically carrying on the family business, which was started by his grandfather Sumner P. Mills in Stonington in 1904.
“He was from Stonington, but then he met my grandmother, a Farmington woman, Flora Pearson, whose family lived on the property where the United Trinity Church is now,” Paul said. “By 1911, he was moving to her hometown and opening the present law firm in downtown Farmington.”
Paul said Sumner was in business in downtown Farmington for 45 years, most of those years in the firm’s current offices that have grown over the years from two rooms to 4,000 square feet. It is on the corner of Main Street and Broadway, above Liquid Sunshine.
The last 15 of those years, Sumner’s son, Peter Mills Jr., father of Paul, joined the firm after already having practiced with a firm in Augusta.
Sumner’s son, Peter, was born the same year his father began the firm in Farmington in 1911.
It was early 1940 when father and son began working together and they were the original Mills & Mills.
“They were very diversified,” Paul said. “They had a general practice with some civil litigation, some real estate, some business corporation practice, a little bit of criminal and domestic law and a little bit of creditor rights,” Paul said. “They also sold fire and casualty insurance, which was a common practice for attorneys in those days.”
Sumner died in December of 1956 and Peter, who died 10 years ago and would have turned 100 years old in August, carried on although while Peter served as U.S. Attorney two times, first from 1953 to 1961 and then again from 1967 to 1977. Ruth Gould ran the firm as an insurance agency from 1956 to 1961 and Ruth Pullen covered the office from 1969 to 1977.
Peter returned to the family practice and stayed as active as possible until the very end at age 90.
Paul, still a young and enthusiastic attorney as well as a very active member of the community, joined the firm in 1977.
He also has two siblings who are attorneys.
Peter Mills has a well known practice in Skowhegan, Wright & Mills. He is currently on leave from there, working as the director of the Maine Turnpike Authority.
Janet Mills was the district attorney for Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties for more than 14 years. She was the first female district attorney in New England. She also practiced for a number of years with her older brother and has served as attorney general for the state of Maine. She is currently practicing in Augusta with one of the largest law firms in Maine.
Paul said most rewarding has been the diversity of challenges he’s had since he’s been with Mills & Mills, and his goals for the future are to continue to provide those services to people of the Franklin County area as Mills & Mills has done for the past several decades.
“The variety of vivid experiences and the personal associations I’ve had with so many great people, clients as well as staff, has been and continues to be incredible,” Paul said. “It’s exhilarating on a daily basis.”
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