Lt. Colonel Lawrence B. “Larry” Mills passed away on December 5, 2023 at Community Memorial Hospital in Ventura, California. Larry was born in Los Angeles, California, the third child of Edward and Inez Mills, shortly before they moved to Ajo, Arizona. At a music camp at Arizona State College he met his future wife Ethel Lodemie Barris and together they attended what would become ASU. When Larry graduated early with a commission in the Air Force, they were married in Danforth Chapel and began his first career in the service of our country.
Blessed with four children in four years they moved 15 times in the next 12 years, as Larry continued to receive promotions. He retired from the military in 1969 and moved to Ventura, California where he began a second career as a middle school teacher with the Ventura Unified School District. He would live in Ventura for the next 54 years.
Larry was an adventurer and a storyteller, regaling class after class of hapless middle-schoolers with a checklist of stories of Alaskan brown bears, rattlesnakes and dynamite. More than one precocious student learned that they just had to say “tell us a story” and algebra was out the window. But Larry’s own story was powerful as well. He courageously overcame losing his father at an early age and set about learning how to love his wife, his children and ultimately himself. In mid-life he put his faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and experienced the genuine love of his Heavenly Father. He was in no way
perfect but learned to laugh—and make you laugh—at his imperfections. His self-deprecating and sometimes eccentric humor was at the same time alarming and disarming but always came from a pure heart. He practiced gratitude. His first thoughts in the morning and the last thoughts at night were prayers of thanksgiving for God’s blessings—particularly for his children, his grandchildren and his wife of 68 years.
He wouldn’t want us to give you the wrong impression. Larry was a tad incorrigible and seemed to take impish pleasure in his secret life of crime which included jaywalking, taking an extra sip at the soda fountain and shamelessly wearing clashing plaids. He had a soft heart for the poor and was generous almost to a fault. He loved animals—particularly wild ones—and was fond of saying he spent a significant portion of his children’s inheritance on peanuts for the migratory birds he fed out his back door.
Following his second retirement from teaching he returned to one of his favorite avocations—music.
Some of his children’s earliest memories were of him on the piano late at night playing anything from Chopin to the latest popular tune. Larry knew over a hundred songs that he could play by ear and by heart. He regularly made the circuit of several area residential communities, playing on the piano for hours on end . It broke his heart when Covid intervened and he could no longer share what he loved with those he had come to love.
Throughout his life he loved exercise, daily lifting weights his children wouldn’t dream of trying to pick up. His determination kept him walking—even up to days before his passing—and in recent years Larry could be seen navigating the early morning fog and walking the streets of Victoria Heights.
Larry was preceded in death by his lovely wife of 68 years Ethel Lodemie (Barris) Mills, his father Edward Mills, his mother Inez (Mills) Klomhaus, his sister Evelyn Davis and her husband Roy, his sister Christina Dorsey and her husband George; nephew David “Davy” Davis; nieces Kay Davis Brown, Lorraine Dorsey Stegman and Linda Davis Zenonian.
Larry is survived by his children Beverly Mills (Steven Columbus), Virginia Phillips (Steve), Marilyn
McGettigan (Steve) and Dave Mills (Karen); grandchildren Amy Armour (Ryan), Alex Starkenburg (Lacey),
Mina Gonzalez (Hugo), Joseph Phillips (Rebeca), Jason Snyder (Aniseh Sjona Bro), Chelsea Troeger
(Jordan), Matthew Mills (Alyssa) and Madelyn Mills (Truman) and numerous other “greats”—grandchildren, nieces, and nephews.
Larry’s family would like to recognize and warmly thank his amazing neighbors and friends—some spanning five decades and others he just met—for their many, many kindnesses both to him and our mother. We would especially like to thank Liz Sanders for her thoughtful and compassionate friendship with dad over the years and to the deacons and friends at Olivet Community Church whose “sticky notes” of encouragement plastered the bookshelves of his home.
A famous theologian was once asked “What is the deepest insight you’ve ever had?” After a thoughtful pause, this wise philosopher is said to have quoted the simple lyrics of a children’s song. Hours before his death, Larry’s video monitor caught him loudly singing to himself the lyrics to that same timeless melody: “Jesus loves me, this I know. For the Bible tells me so.” Yes, Dad, your Savior loves you and so do your friends, your immediate family and the generations who came after you!
Family and friends are invited to a Celebrations of Larry’s life will be held on Friday, December 15, at 11:00 a.m. at Joseph P. Reardon Funeral Home & Cremation Service, at 757 E. Main Street Ventura California, where the family will receive guests at a visiting hour preceding the services from 10am to 11am, and on Wednesday, December 20 at 11:00 a.m. at Olivet Community Church in Evansville, Indiana.