Dr. Thomas Millar

Born in Edmonton, Alberta, on April 2, 1923, Thomas Palmer Millar moved to Vancouver as a child, growing up there in the Great Depression. After graduating from Kitsilano High School in 1941, he enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force and was a pilot in the RAF’s famous 13 Squadron, serving in England, North Africa, and Italy.

After the war, he attended university, receiving a bachelor’s degree in psychology and English from the University of British Columbia in 1948 and a degree in medicine from McGill University in 1951. He married and had three sons and a daughter. He completed his training in psychiatry at the University of Michigan, after which he moved to Seattle, entering private practice in child psychiatry. After moves to Vancouver and Connecticut, he returned to Canada in 1973, practicing in West Vancouver until his retirement.

Dr. Millar was also a prize-winning playwright and the author of numerous articles and short stories and over 50 professional papers. In his 70s he took up painting, and some of his works have been shown in the Vancouver area. He was an avid skier, a keen swimmer, and a great fan of Granville Island and the Canucks hockey team.

Dr. Millar passed away on July 12, 2002, after a short but intense battle with cancer.

Dr. Laura Millar

Thomas Millar’s daughter Laura Millar, who has been a freelance editor, publishing instructor, and international consultant for twenty years, helped her father establish Palmer Press in the 1980s and is honored to take on the reins of the company after her father’s passing. Laura obtained her PhD in archive studies from the University of London in 1996, studying cultural policy and its relationship to history and archives in Canada. She’s not a physician, but her father loved introducing her as “my daughter the doctor”!