page_title: John Harrison Mills
section_title: Founding the local Bahá'í communtiy and the Mills
hierarchical_section_title: John Harrison Mills / Biography / Buffalo / Founding the local Bahá'í communtiy and the Mills
caption_attribution_description: English: Painting of Alphonso Minor Griswold
context_page_description: John Harrison Mills was born and died in western New York state, United States. He was raised on a farm but was on to start his art career into Buffalo, New York, just as the American Civil War came on, which he barely survived, advanced his writing and art career including with the rising Mark Twain, extended it further while living in Colorado published in national magazines with his growing family and his art was sold as well as kept in collections like at the Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum and advanced the success of the business of art. Then back to New York where he again organized the business of art and then back to Buffalo where he continued his art and added to the Albright Gallery collection, as it was known then, and casting bronze works.
context_section_description: Mills formally presented recent portraits at a reception in January 1906, and Henrietta attended a class on French history. The meetings the Mills hosted were noted in mid-January with a special guest coming though it wasn’t said who. January closed with Henrietta attending a mass meeting of women’s clubs, and in February Mills joined in the founding of and was named a director for the Artists and Illustrators Club of Buffalo, set an exhibition of his art students, and in late February Mill’s poems "What they did to the flag" and the Gettysburg poem was asked for in the newspaper. March opened with Henrietta attending a club who had merged with the Sunshine Society. Later in March daughter Margaret came to town, and a week later Mills finished a portrait of the youngest son of Seneca Chief Red Jacket.
  The first public mention of the Bahá'í Faith in the newspapers came in relation to the meetings at the Mill’s home. It was by their daughter Margaret, held approaching the period of the Bahá'í holy day of Ridván in a series of talks from April 19, about the time meetings of the Bahá'ís were later credited beginning. Mills later referenced his interest in the religion back to 1902 when he was living in New York city. The religion had been mentioned in relation to visitors to Green Acre in 1902 in Buffalo, already a place Bahá'í scholar Mirza Abu Fadl was visible, and, as characterized by the visitor there, the whole situation was one of an emphasis on freedom of religious exploration and against the “spirit of commercialism". Rev. Howard C. Ives had given a sermon there in early 1905 and would join the religion. Another early mention of Bábí-Bahá'í history was also in a Buffalo newspaper in 1905. However it seems none of this was known to the Mills - or at least not enough. They wanted to have more Bahá'ís around to work with. In November the Bahá'í House of Spirituality of Chicago, a precursor of the Bahá'í administrative institution the Local Assembly, wrote to Henrietta which scholar on the religion Robert Stockman summarized as: "We would love to help in Buffalo; but we don't know of any believers there." Quite possibly the connection to the Mills with the religion was their son-in-law Charles Sprague. In 1900 Charles had already been an active Bahá'í in New York. However by later 1905 Charles had moved to Philadelphia and by early 1906 Margaret was now living in Buffalo.
  The Mills attended a large reception of the Buffalo Society of Artists in late April, and he exhibited some paintings of his. In mid-May a followup Tea was held with Henrietta attending and further work by Mills for another exhibition. After a couple weeks lapse of meetings, luncheons and exhibitions at the Mills home started again later in May. Millsʻ daughter Margaret was set to speak at the Progressive Thought League of Buffalo, (the "League",) and showed a well-received painting “Spirit of the Storm" in June. The League had been organized in January that year by Elizabeth Marney Conner and Grace Carew Sheldon. Margaret was soon going to present a paper there with quotes of Bahá'uʻlláh. The League report in the newspaper mentioned that when Margaret read her paper Bahá'í Margaret Peeke commented from the audience that she had seen 'Abdu’l-Bahá, (following her 1899 pilgrimage,) then head of the religion. Daughter Margaret's paper was printed in the newspaper. It doesn’t have citations but mentions Mrs. Brittingham, a book by Phelps, and quotes from the Hidden Words of Bahá'u'lláh: “O Son of Man! My eternity is my creation and I have created it for thee…"
  A couple weeks later Mills’ poem "The Third Day" for the memorialization of the Battle of Gettysburg was published in Buffalo just before Independence Day. A week later Margaret shared a letter from Bahá'ís on pilgrimage about prayer at the League meeting, and by mid-July she was a vice president of the League and commenting on 'Abdu’l-Bahá. The Mills were then away for two weeks to Ontario for a vacation, immediately following which Bahá'í Alma Knobloch was the guest of the Mills. Knobloch initiated 
caption: American humorist Alphonso Minor Griswold portrait by Mills in 1909
exif: {}