Olympic skier Ralph Miller, a UK doctor and husband of Lexington mayor, dies at 88.
Dr. Ralph Miller, an Olympic skier and longtime University of Kentucky physician whose wife Pam served a decade as mayor of Lexington, died Sunday. He was 88.
Miller had cancer, according to Debra Hensley, a close friend of Pam Miller who served with her on the Urban County Council.
Pam Miller, the couple’s children and several of their grandchildren were with Miller when he died, Hensley said.
The couple, who had three children and nine grandchildren, had moved in 2017 to Lexington, Mass., near where two of their children live.
Ralph Miller was a world-class athlete as a young man.
He was the best Alpine skier in North America in 1953, when he was the U.S. downhill, slalom and combined champion; set a world speed record in 1955; and competed in the 1956 winter Olympics in Italy, according to prior stories in the Herald-Leader.
He remained active long after his Olympic days, taking part in hang-gliding, skiing, snowboarding and running, winning his 65 to 69 age group in the 2003 Bluegrass 10K in Lexington.
Pam Miller said her husband climbed Mount Kilimanjaro at age 78.
“He was remarkable. He got an enormous amount out of life and gave it to other people,” Miller said. “Very adventurous and always looking for a challenge.”
Lexington Mayor Linda Gorton said Ralph Miller “embraced life to its fullest.”
“He was an Olympic skier, a hang-glider and was always ready for adventure,” Gorton said. “Ralph and Pam made a wonderful life together, serving the greater good.”
At age 76, Miller survived a hang-gliding accident in Mexico in 2009, in which he suffered seven broken ribs, several cracked vertebrae, a punctured and collapsed right lung, a head injury and internal bleeding.
Miller started working at UK in June 1970. He retired in July 2009 after the accident.
Hensley said Miller was an an outstanding athlete, brilliant physician, supportive husband, amazing father and grandfather, and loyal friend.
“He was also one of the most charming, kind, beautiful, and accepting people I have known.,” Hensley said. “Ralph was a champion and he championed everyone as he looked for the potential in people . . . always curious . . . constantly testing his own rationale and learning from others. He expected a lot from himself.”
Miller was an associate professor and endocrinology specialist at the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center.
Dr. Jackson Smith, an endocrinologist at UK who worked with Miller beginning in 1994, said Miller’s patients loved him. Miller was scholarly in his approach to providing care and passionate about trying to motivate his patients and colleagues to stay active, Smith said.
“He was a fantastic physician to all his patients,” Smith said. “He was an inspiration to all to be physically fit and stay active and to live life at its fullest.”
Miller stayed active until he got sick, playing tennis, walking and working out, Smith said.
Miller grew up in New Hampshire. He attended medical school at Harvard and the couple moved to Lexington in 1970 after he finished a fellowship at Stanford University, according to earlier reports.
Pam Miller was elected to the council in 1973 — only the second time a woman had sat on the city’s governing body — and then became the city’s first female mayor in January 1993, replacing Scotty Baesler after he was elected to Congress.
She later won two full terms as mayor, leaving office Dec. 31, 2002.
Miller said her husband, who loved living in Lexington, was “enormously supportive” of her political career and got a kick out of being the city’s “first gentleman.”
He said in a 1999 profile that he didn’t take part in ribbon cuttings, church socials or parades, however.
“I don’t care about being the mayor’s husband . . ., “ he said. “I enjoy being Pam Miller’s husband.”
Funeral arrangements for Ralph Miller are pending.
This story was originally published November 22, 2021 at 12:05 PM.
