Hollis Keith Mcmilan

For nearly as long as I can remember I have been drawn to far away places. I have vivid memories of standing on the couch in the first house I lived in in Eugene, Oregon, looking out the window at hills in the distance and imagining China was just on the other side. I wanted to go there.

The first trips I remember were train trips from Eugene to Berkeley where we would get off the train and then onto a ferry boat to take us to San Francisco. The story I was told was that when the ferry docked in San Francisco I grabbed a hold of a deck staunchion and refused to let go because I did not want to get off the boat.

My first real travel came in 1959 when my dad was lucky to get  a three-month sabbatical from his medical practice and took my mother, my sister and me to Europe for the summer. We flew via prop plane to New York, boarded the USS Independence bound for Naples, Italy. What a summer! We traveled from southern Italy through Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, Scotland and England. In London we boarded a JET to travel back to Portland. That was just about the most exciting thing imaginable back then. On the flight home we saw the northern lights.

My next exciting adventure came after graduation from high school. My friend Michael McBurney and I received a graduation present that was just the best - a summer in Europe. It was a reprise of the trip I took three years earlier with my family. We flew to New York, boarded the USS Independence, this time bound for Genoa, Italy. There we picked up VW Beetle and drove through Europe. Needless to say it was quite an adventure for a couple of teenagers. We slept in all kinds of places and never spent more than a dollar or two for a nights lodging.

Four years later after graduating from the University of Texas at Austin, still hungry for travel and adventure, I joined the Peace Corps. I joined India 40 and was sent to India in 1966 where I served for two years in a town called Vaijapur.  Instead of attending the final conference with the group I hopped on plane in New Delhi and flew to Kabul, Afghanistan. That remains the most exotic city I have ever seen. Surrounded by soaring peaks, making a smooth glide path impossible, the plane had to circle down to reach the airport. Signs painted on shop windows were in Greek, Sanskrit (Hindi), Farsi (Persian), English, and Chinese. I was told that there were still people of Greek heritage living in and around the city who claimed ancestry dating back to the time of Alexander the Great!

After a brief stay in Kabul, I flew back to Bombay. Since reading a series of books in junior high school written by Howard Pease about young men who travelled the world on tramp steamers during the depression I dreamed of becoming a merchant seaman. Being in Bombay provided the opportunity to fulfill that dream. There, I signed on a merchant ship as a "messman" and worked my way back to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. By paying union dues in Philadelphia, I became a member of the Seafarer's International Union and was able to get "seamans papers" from the United States Coast Guard.

I then flew back to the West Coast and shipped out of Seattle, Washington and San Francisco, California to a number of Pacific ports including Saigon, Cam Ranh Bay, and Da Nang in Viet Nam, White Beach, Guam, Hong Kong, Yokohama, Japan and Anchorage, Alaska. Ireally loved San Francisco and settled there briefly. Through a lucky connection I was able to get a job managing a waterbed store at the corner of Bay and Hyde Streets. I don't think there was a better product to be selling in 1970 than water beds or a better place to be selling them than San Francisco. The store was only a few blocks from the famous Buena Vista Cafe where I often went for lunch (and an Irish coffee). I also worked as a bartender and waiter at The Refectory in Walnut Creek. But by then I was tired of the nomadic life and ready to settle down and pursue more satisfying and meaningful life's work.

I entered law school at the University of Oregon in Eugene in 1972. That was the end of travel and adventure but it did provide a whole different avenue of exploration.

I graduated with my JD in June of 1975. Thinking I would return to San Francisco to practice, I took the train to the San Francisco and studied for the California Bar. The day after taking the bar exam, I left the City and returned to Eugene and then quickly moved to Portland. Unfortunately the mellow atmosphere of the late 60's and early 70's had vanished with the advent of hard drugs like heroin and speed. The mood of the City had turned dark and violent. I quickly felt at home in Portland and in December 1975 I was notified that I had passed the California Bar Exam. At the time I was staying with an old friend Jim Kenin. His neighbor Charlie Crookham just happened to be a judge and he was kind enough to walk over and swear me in to the California over a glass of good Scotch.  

Waiting to take the Oregon bar I took a job working for the Civil Rights Division of the Bureau of Labor. Oregon offered a winter bar exam for the first time in February 1976. I took it, passed and was admitted to practice in Oregon in February 1976. I has been a litigator since beginning work with the Metropolitan Public Defender Services in July 1977. After three years trying cases in the state court system, I moved to the Federal Public Defender's office. In addition to a case load of federal criminal cases and state habeas corpus cases, I was responsible for opening the first branch office of the Federal Defender in Eugene and I was named Chief Deputy of the Federal Public Defender for the District of Oregon in 1983.

I joined the law firm of Markowitz and Herbold in 1986 where  tried complex civil cases for thirteen years before leaving to go "in house" with a Markowitz client to manage that client's litigation nationally. Managing litigation was challenging and fun but lacked the excitement and satisfaction of representing clients and helping them solve problems through litigation so I returned to private practice with another Portland firm. I am now a solo practioner and continue to handle business litigation and counsel clients regarding a variety of business issues.